In Dreams
by SpamWarrior
Summary: In dreams, we are all mad...Susan has a nocturnal visit from a certain departed Assassin. Susan x Teatime. Please, don't kill me.
1. First Night

Summary/Perpetrator's Note: Susan, post-_Hogfather_, drifts to sleep one night and has rather disturbing dreams...not for the faint of heart, or stomach. She and Teatime just had such great chemistry in _Hogfather_ that I couldn't help but write this, though by all laws of right and sanity it shouldn't exist—Terry Pratchett would probably have an aneurysm of horror if he ever heard of it, and even I feel slightly as though I need a good scrub. With lye. And possibly bleach. I therefore bid you read on, if you dare, and I warn you, this is weird. Very, very, VERY weird, so feel free to flame me into oblivion for the horrendous (but still somehow unrepentant) abuser of canon that I am.

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The eerie half-darkness peculiar to a snowy night had descended, and Susan was thoroughly worn out. Gawain, Twyla, and the neighborhood children had spent the day merrily hurling snowballs at one another (occasionally with rocks inside of them), and she had in turn spent it patching up the various war-wounds and succoring the losers with cocoa and biscuits. It never failed to mildly horrify her, just how good she was with children—it wasn't as though she'd had any practical experience up to now, and she certainly didn't see herself as the maternal type, but she'd never yet met a child she couldn't manage. Occasionally she wondered just where it had come from; her family, being what they were, did not exactly suggest hot chocolate and fuzzy bunnies, but that seemed to be what most children thought of on sight of her.

She sighed, fastening the buttons of her night-dress while her hair uncoiled itself and settled sleepily around her shoulders. It was as tired as she, and did not put up its usual fuss at her assumption of night-time rituals; ordinarily it fought to stay in its bun until she'd wrestled it out with brush and comb. Normally she would lay awake a while and read, after the children were in bed, but just now all she wanted was to collapse between the sheets and let oblivion have hold of her for a good ten hours.

Gratefully she sat down, blowing out all the candles but one, and ran her hand over the soft coverlet. Though she'd grown up the child of a duke, she much preferred this sort of apartment--small, homey, and above all, lived-in. Her parents house had been a mausoleum, a place so old and full of personality that it was difficult to feel you actually _lived _there, and as for her grandfather's place… No. Death's house lent itself to many descriptions, but 'homey' was not one of them.

"Bugger it," she said aloud, crawling beneath the blankets and extinguishing the last candle. She was asleep almost before her head hit the pillow.

Some time later she woke, or thought she did, convinced through her muzzy haze of sleep that she was not alone.

_If it's that blasted rat again, I swear, I'll throw him to Twyla's cat, _she thought, rolling over and rubbing blearily at her face. She fumbled for the matches and lit a candle, squinting into the darkened shadows that lurked in the corners. Rather irritably she rose, pushing a tendril of wild white hair out of her eyes, and padded toward the fireplace—if one of those bogeymen had decided to stop by, she'd give him what-for in quite short order.

She had almost reached the hearth when what was unmistakably an arm slipped around her waist, in the same instant that a hand clamped over her mouth, stifling her startled shriek. Automatically she tried to bite it, with an astonishing lack of success, and her struggles abruptly ceased when a voice whispered next to her ear.

"Don't scream," it said. "I do hate it when people scream. It gets so very...tedious." It was a soft voice, low and somewhat boyish, filled even in a whisper with a peculiarly dreadful sort of glee. It was enough to turn Susan's blood to ice—she recognized it at once, for only one person she'd ever met had managed to convey such an air of merrily deranged malevolence. She froze, tensing like a spring, and the voice laughed quietly into her ear.

"I'm going to take my hand away now, and I want you to promise me you won't do anything foolish, or I might get very upset. Nod if you understand."

Susan nodded. She was afraid not to.

_But the bugger's _dead, she thought wildly, the only thought her mind was capable of producing, under the circumstances. _Gods know I should know it, I bloody well killed him..._

The hand was accordingly removed from her mouth, and Susan was spun around to find herself facing the warm, open, friendly, and incomparably terrifying visage of Jonathan Teatime. His mismatched eyes were scant inches from her own, boring into hers with their customary expression of cheerful dementedness. She stared at him, a steady refrain of _ohbuggerohbuggerohBUGGER_ running through her head and drowning out any other, more useful thoughts. His arms latched securely around her waist, pulling her close to him, and he smiled happily down at her.

"Oh, Susan, how I've _missed_ you," he said, the words a little too sincere for comfort. Susan's heart lurched into her throat as he seized one of her hands and waltzed her around the room, giggling like a child with a new toy. "It's very lonely being dead, do you know that? Nothing to do, no one to see, no one to...kill. So I thought, don't you know, I'd pay you a little visit, see how you were getting along..." He backed her into the wall, the dim light from the window throwing sharp shadows over his face and glinting weirdly off his glass eye. "...See, perhaps, if there were any new men in your life. _Are_ there any men in your life, Susan?"

Susan, for once in her existence caught so off-guard she was hardly certain of her own name, mutely shook her head, wondering what in hell she'd eaten, to cause this sort of nightmare. She _had_ to be asleep—the dead couldn't return; she of all people should know that well enough. This was simply a vivid dream, it had to be, but it didn't make it any less..._weird._

"Oh, _good_," Teatime said gleefully. "I was hoping that was the case, because it makes all this _so_ much easier." He leaned toward her, one hand pushing an errant strand of hair from her face, and Susan, in the grand tradition of all trapped in the Twilight Zone, went right ahead and put her foot in it.

"It...it makes _what_ easier?" she asked, unable to think under the unsettlingly piercing gaze of those mismatched eyes. It was like looking into a black hole, and finding something in it looking back. _The poker's in the other room…if it would even do any good. How do you kill a dead man?_

Teatime smiled at her, bending his curly head even closer. "This, of course," he said, and kissed her.

This was the point that Susan became convinced that not only was this a dream, it was a dream in which she'd apparently gone temporarily insane. For instead of doing something sensible, like punching him, kneeing him in the groin, or clawing his eyes out, she found that she was letting him kiss her—more than that, she found, to her not inconsiderable astonishment, that she was kissing him back. She had kissed Imp, in her awkward adolescence, and the few others who had followed him, but it had been nothing like this—this was a kiss that burned, a kiss that could drive you over the edge of sanity, if you let it. _Where the _hell _did he learn that?_ she wondered, insofar as she was capable of wondering anything.

Her hands found the front of his shirt as her knees turned quite suddenly to jelly, and his arms slid around her and pulled her to him, somehow managing to keep her on her feet as he continued to kiss her half senseless. He tasted of heat and cinnamon and spices, and when at last his lips left hers Susan found herself gasping for breath like a drowning woman.

"...Wow," she said, sagging against him as her legs gave up all attempt at supporting her. "That, huh?"

"That," Teatime affirmed, and kissed her again, lifting her quite gently as he did so. He was scarcely taller than she herself, but incredibly strong, and he deposited her on the bed as though she weighed nothing at all. He broke the kiss long enough to run his fingers through her hair, which appeared to be as acquiescent as she herself, parting before his hands like water. "And this," he murmured, brushing his lips along her hairline, pausing to nibble at her ear before descending lower and leisurely exploring her neck. "And perhaps this..."

Susan choked on a gasp as his hands traveled over her, finding their way to the buttons of her (naturally) sensible night-dress. She didn't know why in hell she was letting him do this, even in a dream, but...dear _gods_, the man knew how to kiss. Even in the Toothfairy's kingdom she had felt the pull of his strange, cracked magnetism, but here, with all the force of his attention upon her, trying to resist it was like beating at rain with a flyswatter. The weight of his body pressed against her as he crept over her, his fingers deftly undoing each tiny button—despite his boyish figure he seemed to be solid muscle, and she shivered at the tickle of his hair against her jaw as his mouth traveled still lower, pausing to pay homage to the line of her collarbone.

"...Yes...definitely that, I think," she said faintly, her hands gripping his shoulders. She took hold of his chin, guiding his mouth back to hers. "And maybe this, too."

She was never quite certain just what came next—it was all a blur of sensation, filled with strange, aching sensations that, while not completely alien, she had never felt with such _intensity._ It was as though her body had taken over, relieving her brain of any responsibility as Teatime slipped the nightgown from her shoulders, his strong, blunt, killer's hands following paths of their own devising. Really he was little less awkward than Imp had been, but what he lacked in finesse he made up for in raw talent, seeming to somehow know exactly where to touch and when.

And she let him. She knew, even through her haze of desire, that there was absolutely no emotion involved for either of them—it was purely physical, the fission that had inevitably sprang up from such crackling alchemy as had arisen between them. He might be a very mad (and very dead) Assassin, and she might be, well...Susan, but in that moment neither fact mattered in the slightest—all that mattered was the soft warmth of flesh on flesh, the trails of fire his fingers left along her back.

She wrapped her arms around his neck as his mouth found its way back to hers, and then they were a tangle of limbs and swiftly-discarded clothing, and Susan found herself being drawn up a wholly alien but achingly wonderful spiral of desire, whimpering as his mouth roved over her neck with bruising force, her every nerve alive with a sensitivity she never would have believed possible.

It seemed to go on forever, and at the same time to take no time at all. Delicious shivers ran along her spine, slowly building on one another into an unbearable crescendo that left her gasping helplessly for release. Her fingers dug into his shoulders hard enough to draw blood, and the muffled nighttime quiet was broken as she cried out in unabashed ecstasy, her fingers raking down his back—

—and with that cry she woke, _really_ woke, her forehead bathed in sweat and her hands holding the blankets in a white-knuckled grip. Her eyes flew open, and she gasped for breath until her hammering heartbeat returned to normal, leaving her entire body tingling with delicious, lazy awareness.

Susan lay still for several long minutes, trying and failing to wrap her brain around the fact that she was actually awake, that all of that had been nothing more than a dream. She was profoundly grateful that her room was far from the family's, so that none should have heard her cry—if anyone ever found out about this little...nocturnal lapse of sanity...she felt certain she'd die of embarrassment.

She lit the candle with trembling hands, doing her best to tame the over-excited tangle of her hair. As steadily as she could she went to the end-table and poured herself a glass of water, sipping slowly and trying to restore some measure of rationality.

_It was just a dream_, she thought with a shiver. _A damnably odd dream, brought on by the gods alone know what...I won't even remember it in the morning._

And she might have convinced herself of this, had she not at that moment caught sight of herself in the small mirror above the table. The candlelight was dim, but more than clear enough to show her something that froze her where she stood, and made her drop the water-glass with a crash.

Her entire neck was covered in great, bruise-dark splotches, of a sort that have only one source. Her eyes widened, and she leaned closer to the mirror, unable to believe what she was seeing. Hesitantly she reached up and touched one, feeling the pressure on the tender flesh.

_Oh...BUGGER_, she thought, shutting her eyes hard, as though by doing so she could will away the splotches. _This is not happening, this is NOT HAPPENING— _

And then an arm slid around her waist, and hot breath brushed across her ear as a low, throaty voice whispered.

"How I've missed you, Susan."

------

-Finis-

Well, now that that's done I think I have to go and do a self-performed exorcism...hopefully this little bit of horror has ripped the idea out of my head once and for all, and it can be happily buried in oblivion. :shudder:


	2. Second Night

Perpetrator's Note: I had intended, when I wrote the first part of this (almost two years ago, good God) for it to be a one-shot. However, I've had several people wonder what would happen if I pursued the idea, so I decided I might as well try. Whatever chapters follow (and I don't know, at this point, how many that may be), will hopefully work as stand-alones.

I've got to warn you now, this chapter is twisted. It's not even remotely gratuitous, but the concept is really quite disturbing, so if you're easily creeped out I'd recommend you skip this one. Once again, feel free to flame the hell out of me--I'm not just abusing canon anymore, I'm beating it with a stick.

Disclaimer: I own absolutely none of this--it all belongs to Terry, who thank God doesn't read fan fiction. I'm making no money off of it, so please don't sue me. J

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Morning came, eventually.

Susan watched the slowly lightening sky, her mind mercifully blank. She wasn't prepared to even try to explain what in gods' name had happened last night--she couldn't remember a thing, after she supposedly woke from that damned dream. The aftermath--Teatime's disturbingly realistic presence--had to have been a dream as well, or so she devoutly hoped.

The dead couldn't come back. She knew it, as surely as she knew grass was green. They could become ghosts, but if Teatime had done it he wouldn't have faded as he had, and in any case ghosts weren't capable of getting into someone's head like that. They tended to be sad remnants of souls, who remained earthbound because they were afraid to go anywhere else. The dead who truly had a pressing need to remain--whether it be vengeance or otherwise--usually wound up as zombies, like Reg Shoe of the Watch.

Whatever the cause of that…episode…she had no desire to go back to sleep. It might have been a fluke, but then again it might not, and she'd seen enough bizarre things in the last few years to know better than to dismiss it outright. She didn't read, or try to write; she sat, staring out the window while her shocked sensibilities repaired themselves.

Finally, though it was still much too early, she rose, washed, and dressed for the day. The normalcy of such a familiar routine shoved much of the night's weirdness to the back of her brain, and when at last she faced the mirror to put up her hair, she was relieved to see her neck unmarred. That alone went a long way in proving that it was indeed just a dream, and much more cheerfully she went downstairs in search of breakfast. Tired though she was, rationality had been restored, and a few cups of tea should wake her up.

Even Cook wasn't up and about yet, so she got herself some toast and tea, and by the time she was finished it was time to wake the children.

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Gawain and Twyla must have somehow sensed Susan had passed a bad night, for they were unusually well-behaved on their way to the park. As usual, she sat and read while they played, and mentally went over the lessons that would follow when they went home. She glanced up to check on them every now and again--Twyla and another little girl had taken over the see-saw, while Gawain sat with a group of boys playing marbles. Occasional grumbles and exclamations of surprise punctuated the game, and Susan, realizing what marble Gawain was using, twitched. Why couldn't he throw snowballs, like a normal child?

The morning had abruptly soured for her--anger had been simmering in her all day, anger at her apparently treacherous brain, and now it bubbled up anew. Her mind was supposed to work _with _her, not _against _her…ugh.

She did her best not to be snappish, when she collected the children and took them home for lunch, and mostly succeeded. Part of the problem--probably a very large part--was that despite the cups of tea she was tired. She indulged the children and shortened that day's lesson, letting them go play in the snow while she sat and watched, nose buried in her book once more.

"Hey, no fair--OOF!" Gawain, slipping and sliding on the sidewalk, had smashed right into the neighbor boy, sending them both sprawling into a snowbank. Susan looked up, checking to make sure nobody had a bloody nose--

--and froze. Sweet merciful hells, he was _right there_, standing just across the street and favoring her with a happy (if insolent) smile. She reached for the poker, which she'd brought out despite the fact that they were just outside the house, but when she looked up again he was gone.

She swallowed, far more irritated than nervous. Dreams were one thing, but waking hallucinations were quite another…either someone was playing tricks on her, or she was losing her mind. She didn't know of anyone who disliked her enough to curse her, and her sanity still felt wholly intact…bugger it all.

_I'll go up to the University my next day off_, she thought, shaking her head and returning to her book. _If some idiot's cursed me, the wizards will know…and if I find out who it is, they're going to regret it. Excessively. _It was possible she'd offended someone in Biers, but the patrons of Biers tended to be much more _direct_ when it came to letting you know you'd annoyed them. And in any case, most of the pub regulars knew better than to mess with her--it wasn't just bogeymen who'd felt the sting of the poker.

Either way, someone was going to pay for this. With interest.

------

Supper came and went, and not long after she put the children to bed. Ordinarily she sat up a while afterward, enjoying the quiet time to herself, but tonight she was too tired. As a precaution she took the poker with her, leaning it against the nightstand, where it was within easy reach. Dream, hallucination, whatever; any phantasm that dared show up was going to have the living snot walloped out of it. Feeling almost absurdly pleased by the idea, she blew out the candle and let sleep take her.

It was a sound that woke her, or made her dream she awoke. Well, not so much a sound as a silence, the heavy silence that comes from a presence that is very consciously making no noise.

She cracked one eye open, but lay very still. Whatever madness had possessed her the night before, she knew at once it wasn't here now--dream or not, her will this time was most definitely her own. Her breathing stayed slow and even, the rhythm of a deep sleeper, until in a split blinking instance she rolled and reached for the poker--

--which wasn't there.

She could have cursed. What kind of self-respecting dream took away things you knew damn well you'd put close to hand while awake? As before, the dream was certainly vivid enough; if her consciousness were this much in control, it should have had the decency to leave her the bloody poker.

A giggle emerged from the darkness, a giggle whose merry malevolence set her teeth on edge. "Looking for this?" There wasn't much light, but Teatime stepped in front of the window, a dark silhouette against the heavy clouded sky. He had the poker in his hand, holding it like a gentleman (or a fop, Susan thought uncharitably) held a cane.

Susan didn't answer. It was dark--too bloody dark--but she didn't dare take her eyes off him long enough to light a candle. She was so furious she could practically hear her blood pressure rising--how _dare_ he invade her dreams a second time? Ghost, curse--she didn't care what he was, he was getting _out_ of her head.

She sat up slightly and snapped her fingers, intending to stop Time. She didn't care that you weren't supposed to touch people you'd caught out of Time--at this point, she was more than willing to do all kinds of damage.

Nothing happened.

Teatime laughed again, the laugh of a child who'd just enjoyed a particularly cruel joke. "No, that won't work," he said, taking advantage of Susan's sudden shock to bound over to the foot of the bed, balancing on the footboard like a dancer. "None of those happy little tricks work here--you didn't have them in the Tooth Fairy's castle, so you don't have them now."

Finally Susan found her voice. She didn't shout; she didn't snarl. In a real rage her words were quiet, and calm, and cold as a glacier.

"Get out." Sitting the rest of the way up, she reached out and seized the heavy brass candlestick from the nightstand. "Get _out _of my head, or so help me gods I'll kill you again." The fact that he had the poker and could, at least theoretically, impale her with it had been dismissed as irrelevant--though she knew people could die in dreams, she was far too enraged to care.

He laughed again, his glass eye--_he can't have that, Gawain has that, it's in his marble box right now--_glowing faintly in the dark. "Why should I?" he asked, childish and taunting. "I had so much _fun _here last night, Susan. And," he added, almost petulantly, "I certainly thought _you _did, too."

Susan froze. Rather than blush she went white as a sheet, gripping the candlestick so hard she half fancied she left indents. There was something different about him, something that made him far nastier than he'd been in the Tooth Fairy's castle--a kind of conscious maliciousness, much more adult than the rest of his personality.

"Out," she said again, ignoring his words. NOW. She might not have the rest of her ordinary powers, but the Voice was still there, as jaw-cracking as ever.

Unfortunately, it didn't work any more than trying to stop Time. _Ulp._

Teatime grinned in the darkness. Before she could blink he moved, tossing the poker aside with a clang that sounded far louder than it should have. Mere moments later he had her pinned, his body warm and solid and terribly immovable. Dammit, this was _her _dream--she wasn't going to let him do things like that. But before she could even begin to say so he laughed again, that damnable childish giggle that made her want to smack his face off. "Shhh," he said, shushing her like a child.

He placed one hand on her sternum, palm flat and warm through her nightdress, and with that touch Susan felt all the breath go out of her. With the other he reached for the candlestick, prying it from fingers gone treacherously numb, and set it on the night stand. She tried to sit up, but the weight of his hand sat on her like iron, and she stared in almost horrified disbelief as he flicked a match with his free hand and lit the candle.

"Just what the hell do you think you're doing?" she demanded, and though her voice was even it was only just. He shouldn't be able to hold her down with one arm--strong as he was, she was far from a weakling. And there was no reason, _no reason_ she should find the warmth and pressure of his hand as pleasant as it felt.

Teatime smiled down at her, a smile that was almost but not quite a grin of boyish amusement. "I'm making you want something you don't want to want."

Susan blinked, momentarily nonplussed, trying to dissect the sentence. Once she had she jerked, horrified, and hauled back to slap him.

"Oh, I don't _think_ so," he said, catching her wrist and pinning her hand beside her head. "This is _my _game, _my _rules." His nose was almost touching hers, his eyes--real and false--alight with malicious glee. This close she could smell him--a rich, spicy scent, probably expensive. He paused, seeming to wait for her to respond, but for the moment she could do little more than glare.

With one savage jerk he yanked her forward, twisting and pinning her back against him. "Like I said, being dead is very lonely. You have a lot of time to…think." Godsdamnit, he was too close, too strong--she could feel his breath stirring her hair, and there didn't seem to be a thing she could do about it. "I did a lot of thinking…most of it about you. You _killed _me, Susan--that wasn't very nice. And I think you need to pay for it."

His fingers traced along her throat, his hands oddly rough for an Assassin--most spent serious time with a manicurist. Susan shuddered, and not out of revulsion…good gods, what was _wrong _with her? How was he subverting her body so completely? Her mind at least was very much her own this time--she was furious, and appalled, and now even a little afraid.

"It took me a while to figure out what to do to you," he went on conversationally. "You're not like other people…I didn't know, at first, what I could do that could really punish you. Hurt you, of course--break both your legs every night and leave you like that until you woke up, that was a good one." How cheerfully he said that, she thought, sickened. "But then I realized physical pain just wouldn't work…it wouldn't be enough. And of course scaring you was right out--you don't seem to be afraid of anything I can think of. So," he said, fingers trailing over her collarbone, then up to her jawline, "I settled on this."

Susan swallowed. Though she knew she was going to regret asking, she couldn't help it. "_Why? _Why, you know…this?" _And while we're at it, how in hells' name are you making it work? _She knew of no spell, no drug that could so forcibly alter physical response while leaving the mental alone. Despite his assertions that she feared nothing, she was well and thoroughly scared now, her limbs heavy with the near-panic that accompanies all dreams of powerlessness. And it was still worse than that, because dream or not, she certainly _felt _awake, and had plenty of mental acuity with which to dread what he might put her through.

Teatime shifted his grip on her, bending his head so that his lips brushed her ear. She couldn't fight him--she couldn't _move_; all her strength, all her will of muscle had deserted her. "You're smart, Susan," he said, the words a dreadfully jovial whisper, "you figure it out. Out of all the things you don't want me to do to you…." She felt him smile. "And it's even worse if you _enjoy _it."

Okay, crazy dead Assassins were _not_ supposed to be that perceptive. "But--" she started, the word cut off by a gasp as his mouth left her ear and found her throat. She bit back any further vocalization, trying not to drown in the sudden pleasant jolt that simple action shot through her. _Damn_ him, and damn whatever power had lent him the ability to do this--and damn herself, for knowing no way out.

Susan shifted, trying to move, to force her leaden limbs into some kind of cooperation. It accomplished nothing, save allow Teatime to turn her in his arms, trailing kisses along her jaw. Inwardly she recoiled, viscerally horrified, even as instinct tilted her head back to allow him greater access to her neck. If this wasn't enough to drive her insane, she didn't know what was… Whatever force had so separated mental and physical response had affected her sense of touch as well, infusing it with a preternatural sensitivity that did everything for her nerves and nothing for her brain.

"Stop it--" she said, or tried to; Teatime chose that moment to bite just beneath the hollow of her jaw, turning her words into a moan before she could clamp down on it. She shuddered, her breath dangerously short, and felt rather than heard him laugh.

"Gods, I hate you," she hissed, her fingers clenching in fists she could not use.

"That's the point," he whispered gleefully, and bit her again. His hands were everywhere, slow enough to be torturous and skilled enough to be terrifying. However horrified her mind might be, her body was overriding it by the second, and when he turned her face to him and kissed her all rational thought shut down entirely. If this was indeed a game, for the second night in a row she had lost.

----

A/N: Told you it was twisted. Next installment explains how Teatime got this particular idea in the first place (because you _know_ he would never have thought of it on his own, alive or dead), as well as what Susan intends to do about it.


	3. Third Night

Perpetrator's Note: Yep, it continues. Once again, twisted as all hell, with an added spice of violence--you have been warned. XD

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_Teatime hadn't been kidding, when he'd told Susan being dead was lonely. And boring. Very, very boring._

_He hadn't believed in anything when he'd been alive--had never even thought of it. Despite the fact that he inhumed people for a living, it had never occurred to him that he'd one day die himself. As a result, his afterlife had consisted of…nothing. No light, no air--just an endless void._

_He wasn't alone--occasionally he'd stumble across other souls, drifting through the emptiness. Apparently this place was reserved for everyone who hadn't expected anything after death; he didn't know how many people were here, but it was big enough that he'd drifted several days in utter solitude._

_There being nothing else to do, he'd spent his first few days watching the living. Watching Susan. Human emotion was a relatively foreign concept, but he was nearly certain he was severely, severely annoyed that she'd killed him. It wasn't _fair_--he was sure using a poker was cheating. You were supposed to use normal weapons, or none at all._

_And she didn't seem to care that she'd done it. Well, okay, he could kind of understand--he'd never regretted killing anyone--but she was a _girl. _They were supposed to be soft, weren't they? Not that he'd know--the only girls he'd known had been very brief acquaintances. Still, he got the impression that they were supposed to scream a lot, and twist their ankles, and maybe try to hide under furniture…they _weren't _supposed to slap you and throw a poker through your chest. She'd killed him, and let the little boy keep his glass eye, and she wasn't…sorry._

_She _should _be sorry._

_Teatime didn't know how long he'd been pondering that very problem, but his concentration was abruptly broken by an outside presence. He'd kept some semblance of human form, and so had the newcomer, though both were blurry around the edges. _

"_Whatcha watching?" the stranger asked. He was--had _been_--some years older than Teatime, dark haired and dark eyed and positively brimming with cheerful malice. _

_Teatime pointed. "Her," he said. "She killed me…with a _poker_. I was an Assassin--that's such an embarrassing way for one of us to go."_

"_You're not kidding," the man said, shaking his head. "What a waste…hey, I'm Carcer, by the way."_

"_Teatime," he replied. "Jonathan Teatime. How'd you get here?"_

_Carcer shrugged. "Killed people. Got caught. Got hanged. Not sure how long ago--time in this place doesn't seem to exist. I've run into people I know died thirty years ago, and people who by my reckoning shouldn't be here yet. Doesn't make any sense."_

"_Yeah, this place is bizarre," Teatime said, still watching Susan. "And _annoying_. There's no point in watching if I can't do anything…she should be _sorry _she killed me."_

_Carcer watched beside him, thoughtful. "You know, if she's the one who directly killed you, there _is _a kind of way you can haunt her. You've got a kind of link, you know? Dunno why it works, but I've seen people do it. You really wanted to, you could go back and punish her…make her regret she ever _met _you."_

"_Could I? Could I _really? _Revenge does sound like ever so much fun…I can't _kill _her, can I?"_

"…_Possibly," Carcer said thoughtfully, regarding him closely. "She's the one who killed you, after all…it's happened before. Ever heard of an incubus?"_

"_It's a kind of demon, isn't it?"_

"_Spot on. It's a particular _kind _of demon, and it can, eventually, kill someone. You know what it does, right?"_

_Teatime shook his head. The Guild didn't teach anything about demonology, it not being a subject that had any bearing on inhumation._

_Carcer looked at him in disbelief. "An incubus," he said. "You know, sex demon? Doesn't ring any bells?"_

_Teatime frowned, puzzled. "Should it?"_

"_Argh, kid, you're hopeless," Carcer groaned. "You've got a chance I'd kill for, and you don't even appreciate it._

"_All right, Incubi 101. An incubus gets into a woman's dreams, right? Every night. And each time he, you know, _visits _her, it takes a little of her life. You go to her every night, and you'll have her dead within a month, tops." He somehow managed to grin and leer at the same time._

_Teatime digested this thoughtfully. "A month?" he said at last. "That long? Would it go faster if I cut her head off, or should I gouge her eyes out, too?"_

_Carcer put a hand over his face. "No, no, _no_, kid. You go as an _incubus_, or else it won't work. Look--you've been to Mrs. Palm's, right?"_

_Once again Teatime gave him a blank look. "Why?" he asked. "The Guild does all its own sewing."_

_Carcer gave him a long, measured stare. "Son, I think you and I need to have a Talk."_

_So Teatime listened as Carcer outlined not just the basics, but what he considered the finer arts of the Arts of Love. Teatime had always had a hazy idea of the Theory, as it were, but had never understood its relevance to anything, including him._

"_So let me get this straight," he said at last. "I go down there and do that to her every night, and eventually she'll die?"_

"Yes_, kid," Carcer said, exasperated. "If I was you, I'd make it last longer than a month, but as it is…well, you ought to figure it out for yourself." Though maybe not, he thought--grown man or no, Teatime had as much instinct for these things as an oyster. "You just come back and tell me how it goes, okay?"_

"_Okay," Teatime agreed, still doubtful._

"_Have fun, kid," Carcer said, and grinned nastily._

_------_

Carcer had been right, Teatime thought. The plan, while puzzling, seemed to be working quite well--he never would have expected to goad Susan into saying she hated him, for instance. Carcer had laughed, and given him more advice, and the second night he'd had even _more _fun.

The physical bit had been pleasant--Carcer had been right about that, too--but it was just a side-note, really. The really fun part was seeing what it did to Susan…even when he'd left her mind alone, her body eventually superseded it. She hated him, yet she couldn't stop him…she'd been stronger last night, when he'd left her mind free, but had still lost in the end. He'd have to try something really interesting tonight, before she figured out a way to fight him.

And he had to admit, there was something really _fascinating_ about watching her; the way her eyes glazed and dilated, the way her face flushed so that odd birthmark stood out clearly. It was…nice, doing that with her--she smelled good, and her skin was soft and tasted both sweet and salty. And the fact that it was something _he _did that made her that way, that made her claw at his shoulders (and that hurt, but it wasn't a bad pain) and make such interesting little noises. He didn't really know _why_ it made her do all those things, but he was rather possessively proud of the fact that it did.

And she hated it. Not at the time--no, she most definitely did _not _hate it then--but before, and after, and she hated _him_, more and more. He could feel that hate; it was almost physical, almost something he could sense through her skin.

_I like this plan. I could get used to this._

He didn't have much to do during the day. Sometimes he could make her see him, but not often, so he mostly just followed her. Today he was shadowing her just behind her shoulder, and he knew she felt him--she'd turn every now and again, by turns irritated and startled.

She was going somewhere today, pleading illness to the Gaiters. Teatime didn't think she'd actually seek out a doctor--she was too smart to trust any Ankh-Morpork physician--but wherever she was going, she was on a mission. The perennial Ankh-Morpork street crowd parted like a wave before her, as though the sheer force of her vicious annoyance preceded her. Teatime, following her, grinned happily--he'd done that to her, he'd made her so very, very angry. Not, he reflected, that making her angry was much of an accomplishment--it seemed to be her ground state.

It had snowed again in the night, and despite the foot traffic the sidewalks were still white-frosted. Susan marched grimly through it, sensible black coat flapping like the wings of an angry bat, and after two more blocks he knew quite suddenly where she was going.

She was headed for the University.

Oh, this was going to be _fun._

------

She went to the library first.

Teatime had never been in the library of Unseen University, but he'd heard stories. Supposedly it was bigger on the inside than it was outside, and whole troupes of students had gotten lost in some of the far sections. The books were said to eat each other, and the occasional unwary reader. It wasn't a place a normal person went unless they had to.

But Susan wasn't normal. He watched as she moved among the shelves, collecting stacks of books with titles like _Necromantic Defense _and _Practical Exorcism_. She took up a whole table by herself, a pencil between her teeth, reading and jotting down notes whenever something caught her attention. The rest of the library's occupants steered well clear of her--she lad a look in her eye that boded no good for whoever dared disturb her.

Teatime sighed after a while, impatient. Down here he couldn't stray far from her, and going back and forth was both draining and difficult. So long as she stayed here he was stuck, with nothing to do but kick his heels.

"Oh, come _on,_" he said, unheard. Not only was he bored, he was worried she might actually find something useful, something that would keep him out of her head tonight.

Susan had, in fact, found something useful. In _Practical Exorcism_ it said,

"_Daemons of Nyte are like unto Fairies that cannote abyde the Touch of Iron."_

The poker was cheap, and likely had no iron in it whatsoever. A frying pan, however…she added it to her list.

Teatime frowned. He hadn't expected her to catch on so soon…however vulnerable she was in sleep, she was ferociously competent awake. And that could be a problem.

He briefly debated making her see him, but that took a great deal of effort and in any case might irritate her into looking harder. She couldn't see him, and she couldn't hear him, but maybe…

Her head was bent over her book, leaving several tempting inches of white neck between collar and the bun of her hair. Curious, he ran a finger along it, tracing her spine up to her hair and twining in the loose white curls that had escaped the bun.

Susan gasped, spitting out the pencil, and whirled around. Teatime grinned in satisfaction, trailing his hand over her hair and down the side of her face.

She swatted irritably, as though brushing away a fly. "Quit it," she muttered, glaring at the empty air. Her interrupted sleep had made her angry enough as it was; the last thing she needed was further annoyance. She turned back to _Practical Exorcism, _scowling at it as though daring it to offend her.

"_Beware the Powers of the Incubus. They are notte like unto other Daemons, in that they maye Alter the Will of those they feede upon."_

Well, that explained why she seemed to go temporarily insane when he visited her. She went to jot it down, and nearly snapped the pencil in half when he did it again, running his hand down her throat to her collarbone and back up again to her chin.

"_Quit_ it," she snapped.

"_Beware them also for they Steal of your Life each Nyte, leaving you Weaker and Weaker as Tyme goes onne. Fight of them Early, lest ye lose all Will to Resist."_

Well, that was helpful. Of course she had to fight it--any fool could see that. The book didn't seem to offer any ideas as to how to go about that, however, and she slammed it shut, trying not to grind her teeth.

How the hell had this happened? She knew it was theoretically possible for a dead mortal to become an incubus, but she'd never, ever heard of it actually happening. And _Teatime_, of all people…if she'd thought about it at all, she'd have credited him with as much knowledge of _that _as Twyla. Probably less, she thought sourly, given how cracked his brain was.

She had to do something, and soon. It was too early for her to feel any real effects, but it wouldn't take long for the siphoning of her life-energy to make her seriously ill. Given what the book had said about iron, that seemed to be her best bet for the moment. And tonight she was putting the bloody damn thing under her pillow.

That done, Susan conscientiously put the books back, tidied up her table, and made for a small apothecary in Money Trap Lane. Should the frying pan fail, she wanted to have enough makings for a deep sedative--if she couldn't dream, he couldn't get in.

Gods, this was annoying. He wouldn't stand a chance of weaseling his way into her dreams if she hadn't killed him, but what else could she have done? Even if she'd stopped Time and thrown him out, he'd've just come back later, as soon as she let her guard down. And the fact that he was _succeeding_…that he could so undermine her thought, her will, her bone-deep instincts…well, it made her wish she could stab him with the poker all over again. He would _pay_, before this was over, no matter what she had to do.

Striding back toward the Gaiters', scowling like thunder, she lost all awareness of Teatime's presence behind her. He didn't like that--not at all--but the sheer force of her resentment kept him locked out of her senses as securely as if he were bashing against an iron box.

"Let's see just how long you can keep that up," Teatime said, unheard.

------

There was something else she had to do, something she couldn't avoid any longer. It wasn't normally a disagreeable task, but with her newfound shadow she'd rather chew her own arm off than even think about it.

She needed a bath.

The Gaiters had a modern bathroom, a permanent porcelain tub and piped-in water, instead of the usual buckets-on-the-stove system used by most of Ankh-Morpork. Susan took her time filling the tub, borrowing Mrs. Gaiter's foaming bath salts for once, and while the water was running she popped down to the kitchen and, without a word of explanation, took the heavy cast-iron frying pan. The household servants had long ago learned not to question her, which was just as well--had anyone asked just what she was doing, she'd probably have hauled off and brained them.

"I don't care if you _are_ incorporeal," she said aloud, "if I so much as _sense_ you in here, I'll beat you within an inch of your undead life."

It took her less than thirty seconds to be out of her clothes and into the tub, where the bath salts had done their work well. She knew she shouldn't care what he saw (if he was even there), but dammit, she wasn't going to give him a free show. True to her word, the frying pan rested just beside the tub, a big black anchor of reality.

Susan had always enjoyed relaxing in the bath, but now even that was rather spoiled. Still, she tried, putting off the flannel-and-soap routine in favor of letting the hot water soothe her tense muscles as much as it was able. Which wasn't much, but hey, it was the thought that counted.

Teatime eyed the frying pan. He didn't think it would do her any good while she was awake (he wasn't sure it would help while she was _asleep_, come to that), but he was in no hurry to find out. Susan really was rather terrifying awake, even as badly thrown-off as she was. Still…

"_Psst. Kid!"_

Teatime blinked, as close to startled as he could be. "Carcer?"

"_Yeah, me. Just do it already, okay? She's _in _the bloody _bath. _What the hell are you waiting for? The damn starting whistle?"_

"How did you--" Teatime started.

"_Because it's what I'd do. Now go have fun."_

He glanced at Susan, who of course hadn't heard a thing. It didn't occur to him to wonder why the hell Carcer was hanging around as a spectator--despite the education he'd received in the last few days, his brain just wasn't built like that.

Susan had dunked her head under to wash her hair, and was in the process of wringing it out when he touched her. She jumped, but before she could do anything more his hand came around to cup her chin, tilting her head back as he kissed her shoulder, her collarbone, the nape of her neck, nibbling lightly as his fingers stroked the line of her jaw.

She tensed, and gasped, the full and overwhelming sensitivity of her dreams crashing against her like a wave against a levee. Bugger it, she was _awake_--just what did he think he was doing? Dreams were one thing, but she'd be damned if she'd let him invade her waking life as well. It was with that thought, which had to claw its way up through a sudden haze of aching sensuality, that she seized the frying pan, whirled, swung--

--and nearly dropped it when it _clanged _quite solidly against something she couldn't see.

Susan stared a moment. "_Yes,_" she hissed. That done, she calmly stepped out of the tub, grabbed her dressing gown, and pulled the plug. And when she left, she took the frying pan with her.

----

Teatime also stared, though for vastly different reasons. The blow had knocked him clear across the bathroom, and dead or not, it _hurt_.

"She _hit_ me," he said finally, disbelieving.

"_Hell yeah she did. Kinky."_

"But…but she's not _supposed _to be able to hit me," he protested. "That's not fair."

"_Hey, it can't _all _be easy. I'd watch it, though--just like you've got much more power over her when she's asleep, that pan probably packs a lot more of a wallop. I'm betting you can't touch it in her sleep, either--probably burn the hell out of you."_

"So what do I do about it?" he asked, rubbing his head.

"_Hope to gods she puts it somewhere she can't reach it."_

"That's really not very helpful," Teatime grumbled, and, still rubbing his head, went off to lurk until Susan fell asleep.

------

Unfortunately for Teatime, Susan had learned from last night's problems with the poker. Rather than set the pan aside, she put it under her pillow, where it was definitely within easy reach. Even if he _had _been able to touch it, there was no way he'd sneak it out without her knowing about it.

Even more unfortunately (for him, at least), he didn't know where the hell she'd put it--he hadn't made it into the room until she'd already hidden it. It wasn't on the nightstand, nor by the side of the bed, and until she went to sleep he couldn't search for it--though he could touch things (especially her), he couldn't actually move objects. Dammit.

Susan, for her part, fell asleep easily, secure in the knowledge that she could wallop Teatime into next Wednesday, should he dare show up tonight. She wondered, just before sleep took her, if you could beat an incubus to death.

Teatime waited until she was well asleep, her breathing slow and deep and even. She'd know he was there, as soon as he got into her dream--he'd never yet managed to sneak in and remain unnoticed for long. Oh well…nothing for it but to try, really.

He crept up to the bed, silent as a shadow, and managed to lay down beside her before her awareness stirred. His arm slid around her waist, pulling her close, and was just about to breathe her name when she pulled the pan out from under the pillow and brained him with it.

He let out a yelp of mingled pain and surprise, crashing off the side of the bed and into the hard edge of the nightstand. For a moment his vision blacked out, and when it returned he found Susan standing on the bed above him, brandishing the pan before her. She was glaring as though trying to set him on fire with the sheer heat of her fury, and for a moment he stared at her, too stunned to move.

"I don't _think_ so," she said, echoing his words of the previous night. "I don't know if I can kill you, Mister Incubus Teatime--" deliberately mispronouncing his name "--but I'll certainly enjoy finding out." Around the pan came again, smashing his head back into the wall, and despite her bare feet she kicked him hard enough to send him sprawling.

"You--" _thwack_ "--need to go--" _thud _"--back to--" _bong _"--whatever hell--" _thump _"you escaped from." _CLANG_. She'd driven him halfway across the room, herding him toward the window, righteous anger lodged in her chest like a burning ball. "And if I _ever _see you again, so help me gods I will make this look like a bloody _massage_." _THWAP_

That was about all he could take. As soon as she hauled back for another blow Teatime fled, and stood not upon the order of his going.

Susan, panting, scowled at the empty space he'd vacated. She lowered the pan, her scowl turning into a triumphant smile, and crawled back into bed, replacing the pan under her pillow. That had felt far, far better than it probably ought to have--it was hardly the action of a proper adult, but at this point she was beyond caring. Childish or not, there was something immensely satisfying in the feeling of the pan meeting his skull. It was with that mental image that she drifted back into true sleep, immensely pleased.

Round three most definitely went to her.

------

A/N: Poor little Teatime…he is _not _a happy camper. Next chapter sees just what he does for revenge, Susan's attempts to make his undead life hell, and just what happens when (ulp) Mrs. Cake gets involved. XD


	4. Progressive Stupidity

Perpetrator's Note: Once again, disturbing as all get out. Mrs. Cake gives the equivalent of couples' counseling, Teatime gets some extremely unwelcome news, Susan does NOT have a good time, and it all goes from bad to worse. Hints of Carcer/Teatime in this one, and not in a happy way. XD

------

The next day passed remarkably peacefully for Susan. A good night's sleep had done much to curb her temper, and Mrs. Gaiter commented that she was certainly looking better.

It was her half-day--each Sunday the children went to stay with their aunt, who had half a dozen children with whom they could play. More important to Gawain at least, they had several horses he could ride, and pretend he was General Tacticus.

Susan was rather glad of that. She had somewhere she needed to be, and it would have been extremely difficult for her to explain the errand to the children. Besides, while she was giving them proper exposure to the world, she did _not _want to expose them to Mrs. Cake.

She'd never been to the lady's house, but being who and what she was, it wasn't difficult to locate it. It was the one tidy plot in an otherwise seedy area, and also one of the few unmolested by the ruder denizens of said area--like Susan, word about Mrs. Cake got around. Fast.

She rapped on the door, the pan held quite businesslike in her left hand. While she didn't doubt Teatime was still shadowing her, he'd been very, very careful not to let her know about it. Crazy he might be, but he was far from stupid--he didn't want to risk getting the living hell beaten out of him a second time.

The door was opened by a short, round woman who blinked at Susan suspiciously. "Depends on who's asking."

"Mrs. Cake?" Susan said, having a feeling she knew where this was going.

The woman thumped the side of her head. "Sorry about that, luv," she said, blinking. She looked hard at Susan, and at some point beyond her shoulder. "I think I know what you've come about."

Now it was Susan who blinked. "Precognition?" she asked.

"No. You've just brought 'im with you. Come along in, the pair of you."

Susan bit her lip, her face uncertain whether to redden with embarassment or whiten with rage. "You can see him?" she asked.

"Oh yes. You've got a problem, missy."

------

Teatime was in an exceedingly bad mood. Not only did his head still hurt, he was almost amazingly annoyed to have lost his nightly fun. He hadn't realized just how much he enjoyed visiting Susan until he couldn't do it--he felt sure there was something vaguely wrong with much he'd come to look forward to it, but he didn't care. The fact was that he _did_, and hadn't gotten to, and now he was irritated. Possibly even aggrieved.

And now she'd gone to see this woman, this Mrs. Cake, whom even he had heard of. The Assassins wouldn't go after her for love nor money--not only was her house full of creatures that would eat them as soon as look at them, nobody knew quite how many spirits the woman had on her side. And if she could _see _him…

…this could be bad.

"Sit down, sit down. You like some tea, luv?"

Susan sat, eying the lace tablecloth and crinoline-lady centerpiece. "Please," she said. Teatime, unseen by her, stood behind her chair, carefully out of reach should she choose to swing the pan.

"All right." Mrs. Cake gave Susan a cup and saucer, pouring sweet spicy-smelling tea from a chipped ceramic pot. Susan added sugar and sipped while Mrs. Cake pulled the crinoline lady off her crystal ball. "So how'd you get ahold of your incubus?"

Susan choked, nearly spraying tea across the table. "I--wait, _what?_ How do you know--I mean, what makes you say that?"

Mrs. Cake raised her eyebrows. "He's standin' right behind you. It's not exactly difficult."

Susan glanced suspiciously over her shoulder, frying pan at the ready. "He'd _better_ not be," she snapped, and Mrs. Cake bit the inside of her cheek as Teatime (very carefully) stepped backward.

"Oi see you've got the right idea," she said. "This'll work a sight better if Sunny Jim 'ere can participate."

She snapped her fingers, and something jolted behind Teatime's eyes. "There now. Sit down and we'll have a talk, shall we?"

Susan turned, suspicion superseded by outright paranoia, and actually twitched in her seat when she saw him. Almost automatically she raised the frying pan, but Mrs. Cake reached across the table and laid a hand on hers.

"Not now, luv," she said, easing the pan out of Susan's hands and setting it aside. "We've got to talk, not beat."

"Yet," Susan muttered, as Teatime cautiously took the chair beside her. Between Susan _and _Mrs. Cake, even his fractured brain knew enough to be slightly nervous.

"All right, now, you're Susan and Jonathan, am I right? Good. First things first, young man--how did you come to be hauntin' this young lady, and why?"

Teatime blinked. He wasn't at all used to people who were so…straightforward. Um.

"Well, she killed me," he said, glancing at Susan rather petulantly. "Ran me through with a poker."

Susan scowled. "Well, you _were_ trying to kill _me _at the time. What was I supposed to do, let you?"

"Well, that would have been nice, yes."

"Oh, shut up."

Mrs. Cake cleared her throat. "Oi see. Well, that explains 'ow you could come to haunt her. The big question for you, Jonathan, is why?"

"Why, I wanted revenge, of course," Teatime said, as though it were obvious. "I couldn't punish her any other way, I'd've had to be a real ghost for that." He glanced sidewise at Susan. "And it's been ever so much more fun than I expected."

Susan flushed, and kicked him in the ankle. Hard.

Mrs. Cake considered this in silence. She could see damn well that Teatime wasn't the sort of person to whom that idea would come naturally, and also…hmm.

"How many nights has this gone on?" she asked, looking from one to the other.

Susan flushed redder. "Well, he's showed up three times, but last night I…stopped him."

"Brained me, more like," Teatime complained. "Honestly, Susan, I was sure you were enjoying yourself as much as I was, before that. You certainly _sounded _like you were."

Susan bit her lip, her face now a sunset, and kicked him again, hard enough to make him yelp.

"Now now, young man," Mrs. Cake interrupted, before it could degenerate into a schoolyard scrum. "That wasn't her will, and you know it. She didn't have any more choice in the matter than she does of breathin'."

"Well, still," Teatime said, giving her a sunny smile, "either way you _do _make such nice little noises."

Susan sputtered. "I thought I told you to shut up," she said, and punctuated her words by slapping him. "It's bad enough I have to deal with you asleep. Don't _make _me get the frying pan."

"All right, that's enough," Mrs. Cake said. She was peering suspiciously at Teatime. "'Ere, you say you've actually been with her twice now? Not countin' last night?"

He nodded. " I'm really hoping tonight will go better."

"Yeah," muttered Susan. "Maybe I'll get to break your neck."

"Gimme your paw." Mrs. Cake grabbed Teatime's hand before he could protest, laying her palm against his rather than reading the lines. "_That's_ not right," she said, puzzled.

"Damn right it isn't," Susan said darkly.

"No, no. That is--it's too early for you to've pulled out a lot yet, but I should be able to tell at least a little." She was peering at Teatime's hand now, turning it this way and that. "Doesn't make any sense. You've taken from her--" she nodded at Susan "--but you've not gained any. Its' gettin' subverted, like."

"What does that mean?" Teatime asked, extricating his hand and wiping it fastidiously.

"It means while you're takin' it from her, somethin's takin' it from you. I'd look into that, if I was you." She pointed the sugar tongs at him. "You're bein' used, young man. Now you go on a moment--I'll speak with Susan alone, an' then I'll talk to you, all right? And if you try and hang about, I'll know." Handing the pan back to Susan, she added, "And I'll tell her where you are."

That last was enough to make Teatime stay well away--he had a healthy respect for the frying pan. Once he was gone, Mrs. Cake turned to Susan.

"I've bought you some time, luv, but I can't get rid of 'im for you. He probably won't come to bother you tonight, but if he does you just keep that pan handy and you'll be all right. I'd go to the wizards, if I was you--they might be able to tell you how t' get shut of 'im. Nobody outside can break his connection to you, or I'd do it myself. Incubi are damned hard to get rid of."

Susan sighed, putting her head in her hands. "I had a feeling that would be the case. As long as I can get rid of him _somehow_--I can't keep losing sleep to bash his head in every night."

"Well, do somethin' soon--even one or two more nights and he'll start makin' you real sick. Worse'n that, you'll get addicted. After a while, you won't want to stop him. And it's not just what he does at night, mind you--try not to let him touch you at all."

Susan shuddered. "Good to know," she said. "I think. All right, so try the wizards?"

"Try the wizards," Mrs. Cake affirmed. "And I'll see if I can't distract 'im a little more, meantime. Go on and send him in, will you?"

Susan stood, taking the pan, and walked into the kitchen. Teatime was lurking by the stove, examining a crocheted potholder as though wondering what the hell it was. Her stomach lurched; now that she could actually _see _him, his presence seemed much more real. She cursed herself for it, but cursing didn't stop her pulse from quickening, nor her mouth from growing suddenly dry.

"She wants to see you," she said, jerking her head toward the sitting room. Teatime looked at her and smiled, a smile far too knowing for his otherwise childlike demeanor.

"Of course," he said, setting aside the potholder as he brushed past her. He didn't try anything--fortunately, or she really would've brained him again--but as he went by she caught a whiff of that strange, almost intoxicating scent he wore. She didn't know if it was cologne or soap or just him, but it had a terribly unfortunate effect on her knees. He turned and grinned at her, and in a fit of confused juvenility she made a horrible face back at him. Once he was gone she almost fled, seeking both sanctuary and fresh air on the front porch.

_This…is getting worse,_ she thought, and grimaced.

----

Teatime sat across from Mrs. Cake, much less uneasy now that Susan was out of the room. The combination of the two of them was a bit unnerving, but Mrs. Cake by herself what somewhat less so.

"All right, young man, I can't make you let her alone," she said, pouring more tea. "But I can point out a few things to you. One, like I said, you're not keepin' whatever you're takin' from her--check it, it's prob'ly important. Two…am I correct in assumin' you're enjoyin' yourself? With her, I mean?"

Teatime blinked, considering all this. "Well, of course I am," he said, laughing his odd, childish laugh. "It really is terribly fun, and she does enjoy it so at the time. I like seeing what I can do to her."

Mrs. Cake was not often nonplussed, but she stared at Teatime in something approaching disbelief. "And that's…all you're looking for?"

"Well, it _is _nice for me too, but it's more fun figuring out what I can make her do. It's like a game." He gave her a bright smile.

She blinked. "…All right. Well, before you go and take any more from her, go and find out just where what you've taken is goin'." She did not add, _and maybe she'll have time to lock you out again_. This young man unsettled even her, and that took some doing. "And I think, just for everyone's benefit, I'm leavin' you visible. At least she'll know where you are."

Teatime smiled at her again, a smile made all the creepier by its complete lack of malevolence. "Thank you, Mrs. Cake. Good day." He bowed slightly--something he'd been taught at the Guild, though he'd never understood why it was necessary--and left, humming and giggling as he went.

------

Susan was facing the street when he came out, but she sensed him anyway, and caught his wrist when he reached out to touch her.

"Still visible, are you?" she asked, glaring as she turned to face him. "All right, this is how it's going to work. You stay the hell away from me, and I don't beat you with this." She hefted the frying pan in her free hand. "You try to test your luck, I brain you again. Got it?"

Teatime regarded her, his head tilted to one side, smiling his disturbingly childish smile. For once he was silent, just looking, and Susan was about to thwack him on sheer principle--

--but before she could so much as raise the pan he was in front of her, his hands on her arms, pushing her back against the garden fence. Susan opened her mouth to snap at him and he kissed her, long and hard, the weight of his body pinning her.

She gasped, suddenly understanding what Mrs. Cake had said about his touch being addictive. She couldn't even think of resisting, of pushing him away or kicking him or anything sensible like that. The madness of her dreams invaded her waking life with a vengeance, as his hands found her waist and ran up along her sides and down again. This close the spicy-rich scent of him was dizzying, and while the indomitable rock of Susan-ness at the back of her brain screamed in incoherent rage, her renegade body would not give voice to it.

She couldn't breathe, even when his mouth left hers to trace along her jaw. She very nearly dropped the pan, but he drew back before she had to force herself to try to use it.

Teatime looked at her, smiling happily. Wasn't that _interesting--_her eyes darkened the same awake as they did in her dreams, and the flush that crept across her cheeks was the same, too. And seeing her so discomfited…she _deserved _to be that way, to lose that control she'd held onto so fiercely in the Tooth Fairy's castle. The fact that he quite enjoyed kissing her was secondary, really; he wouldn't have enjoyed kissing anyone else even half so much. He ran his hands along her sides again and she arched against him, something that was half gasp and half moan escaping her throat before she could stop it. She glared at him, or tried to; the effect was rather spoilt by her glazed, half-lidded eyes.

"I don't think so, Susan," he said, his hands firm around her waist. "I _like _this game, and I'm going to keep playing it with you. I've got to go somewhere for a while, but I'll be back."

He kissed her again, just as fiercely, but pulled away before her vision could start to darken. And then quite suddenly he was gone, and Susan was left leaning against the wall for support, trying to slow her pounding heart.

_I'll kill him,_ she thought. _Dead or not, I'll _kill _him, and this time I won't do it quickly._

Eventually she collected herself, and headed off in the direction of the University. Much as she did _not _want to explain her situation to the wizards, she had to do something, and fast. Because if he did that again--if he caught her so off-guard--she wasn't at all sure she'd be able to stop him.

------

Teatime had not liked what Mrs. Cake had said about Susan's life-energy going somewhere else. He hadn't like it at _all_, but he had a feeling he knew where it was going.

Crossing back over to the land of the dead was not easy, but an Assassin was used to creeping about in difficult places. Locating Carcer was a much simpler matter--for some reason, the man liked watching Teatime's progress down below.

"Nice going," Carcer said, grinning at him. "See, I _told _you it was fun, didn't I?"

Teatime stared at him, saying nothing. Carcer's smile took on a slightly nervous tinge--the look in Teatime's one good eye was not one he'd ever seen on anyone, and had absolutely no desire to be seeing now. It took a great deal to alarm Carcer, but it was occurring to him that Teatime was quite a bit madder than anyone else he'd ever met. And a bit smarter than he'd bargained for.

"You've got something that's mine," Teatime said quietly. "And I want it back."

"What d'you mean?" Carcer tried another smile, wholly innocent. "I'm _dead_, kid; I haven't got anything except a nice view."

"Oh, yes you do," Teatime retorted, just as quietly, and before Carcer could blink he found his arm twisted up behind his back. Good gods, the kid was strong…what the hell did he think he was doing. "You've been taking everything I've taken from Susan. Why? And don't bother lying to me; I find liars so very…tedious."

"Of course I haven't," Carcer protested. "Why the hell would I do that?"

"You tell me." His arm wrenched higher, and he yelped. Though dead, the spirits of this realm could still feel, and what he was feeling right now was white-hot agony. "How many people have you done this to, Mister Carcer? Tricked into feeding you this force? I'm sure I'm not the only one." Teatime's tone was curious, even jovial, wholly at odds with his words.

"I dunno what you're talking about--OW! Come on, kid, I'm on _your _side."

"Are you? Somehow I doubt that. I'm not stupid, Mister Carcer. Mrs. Cake told me what I'm taking from Susan is going somewhere else, and you're the only somewhere I can think of. Nobody else knows what I'm doing."

Holy gods, the kid was strong. Carcer was no lightweight, but Teatime had him as immobilized as an iron vice. This…could be bad.

"Well, she's not exactly normal, is she? Maybe you're not taking anything," he said, his voice belying his desperation.

Another wrench of his arm. "Oh, I am," Teatime said softly. "I know I am, but I'm not keeping it. How many people, Mister Carcer, and why? What point is there to stealing so much life force?"

Carcer grimaced. "Take enough and you can be solid again," he said, hissing in pain as Teatime twisted his other arm. "I just--can you _stop _that for five seconds? I wasn't hurting you any."

"You were taking what was _mine_. And that's not very nice, not at all. Susan is mine, and what I take from her is mine, and I don't like other people touching my things. I think you owe me."

"I can't give it back, kid! It doesn't work like that…c'mon, is it really that much of a problem?" Once again Carcer's natural pseudo-innocence took over his speech, but it had no effect on Teatime.

"You can't _give _it back," he said, the merriment in his voice replaced by thoughtful curiosity. "It has to be taken?"

"_Yes_, kid. It's not like transferring money or anything. Once it's taken, it would have to be taken back. And you can't do that."

Teatime turned this over, even more thoughtfully. "Well," he said at last. "I know _one _way." He felt Carcer twitch, and giggled madly.

_------_

Susan's visit to the University was…frustrating. The initial embarrassment of telling the Archchancellor just what _kind _of demon she was dealing with paled in comparison to the sheer annoyance of watching half a dozen wizards thumbing through ancient books, babbling at cross-purposes. She was there over three hours, and at the end all she had to show for it was a list of ingredients for a deep-sleep potion (most of which she already had), and a promise that they'd get back to her when they had something to report.

She left in a truly foul temper, still carrying the frying pan as she marched through the streets. It was snowing again, the small light flakes caused by truly deep cold, and she paused to glance upward. She had a feeling Teatime couldn't follow her, if she went to Death's country, but the idea of explaining her situation to her grandfather was not one she even wanted to contemplate. Lack of glands or no, he would either be confused, or furious, or possibly both, and the thought of telling him she had a sociopathic sex-demon infestation was more than she could handle.

No, she'd just drug herself into oblivion tonight, and keep the pan handy, and see, if he did show up, just how much damage she could inflict. The fact that she could now see him while awake was a great help--if she knew where he was, she could bash his brains out much easier than if she did not.

------

Teatime still hadn't come back when she went to take her bath, thank Gods--it was nice to be able to have a good long soak without having to worry about being watched. The laundry had gone out today, too, so her nightclothes and linens were fresh, and all in all she was in a much better mood than she'd been since before all this started. Even her hair had settled down, leaving off its angry coiling and allowing itself to be brushed without protest.

She actually sat up and read a while, the pan a secure lump beneath her pillow, relishing her privacy. Whatever Teatime was doing, she hoped it took him a while--she hadn't realized how dear she held her alone-time until she'd had it taken away.

She didn't get to read for long--the potion she'd made kicked in quite quickly, and she barely had time to put her book aside and blow out the candle before sleep took her.

------

Unfortunately for Susan, Teatime returned to her well before dawn, thrumming with so much energy that he almost felt alive again. Carcer had indeed used people before him, and had had quite a bit of life force saved up. He certainly didn't have any _now_, which was perfectly fine by Teatime--getting it all back had been…highly interesting.

He was more _aware_ now, more conscious of the sights and sounds and scents around him. He was going to have _fun _tonight--pan or not, he was determined round four would be his. And, thanks to Carcer, he had an idea of how to make that work.

------

Despite the sedative, Susan found herself swimming up all unwilling to some semblance of consciousness. This was a much muzzier dream than the others had been, and for a moment she hoped it was indeed an ordinary dream.

She blinked, and froze, and cursed. It wasn't an ordinary dream, and more importantly it wasn't one in which the frying pan would give her any aid at all. Oh, he'd gotten smarter, that was for certain, and apparently rather kinkier as well. Susan didn't actually know the word 'kinky', but she understood its meaning. She swore again, nearly snarling in frustration, furious with both herself and him.

He'd tied her hands to the bloody headboard.

"Well, _bugger_," she snapped, tugging fruitlessly.

Teatime grinned, lying down beside her and sliding a hand over her stomach. "Gladly."


	5. Advice, Ailments, and Annoyance for All

Perpetrator's Note: This story just gets weirder and weirder the more it goes on…Teatime gets a bit more 'advice' from Mrs. Cake, Susan goes to Granddad's to recuperate, and yet another meddling old lady gets involved. I wrote a large part of this while falling-down drunk, too, so I blame any excessive cracktackularness on the booze.

------

That night Teatime didn't leave Susan when she fell back into true sleep, as he had the other nights. He was slightly troubled by how much he'd come to enjoy doing that with her, and even more troubled by the idea that had struck him upon leaving what remained of Carcer. Once he'd killed her, then what? Then he'd have no toy, and he knew that even if he could latch on to some other woman, it wouldn't be the same. Susan was fun to play with because she was Susan; anybody else would just be…insipid.

He traced a finger over her bare shoulder, considering the problem. He didn't know anyone he could ask about that kind of thing, unfortunately…it wasn't as though being an incubus came with a manual. Maybe there was some kind of Guild or something. The original plan didn't suit him anymore--he still might want to actually kill her at some point, but not as soon as she would die if he kept this up every night. And _that_ was…annoying. She was _his _toy, and she wasn't going to die until he said she might.

Susan shifted, mumbling something he couldn't make out. Her hair tickled his neck, her breath fanning warm over his chest, and he looked at her thoughtfully. She hated him so very, very much, but she couldn't stop him…was starting to not _want _to. He'd seen the effect he'd had on her even when she was awake…he liked having that kind of power over her. He _should _have it, and damn her self-control. Teatime had no idea how very, very sick it was, that so much of why he liked sleeping with her was because he had to break that control; that he had to find a way to make her want it. Twisted though his mind was, it wasn't bent in that particular direction.

Hmm. Well, there had to be _someone_ he could ask…this was Ankh-Morpork, after all; you could get just about _any _question answered. He'd start hunting information, and see what he could find….

…in the morning. Right now, for whatever reason, he was quite comfortable where he was.

----

Susan woke with a headache. With a lot of aches, in fact, that she shouldn't have had. Damned dreams were getting more realistic by the night, she thought, as she reached up to rub her forehead--and froze.

There were bruises on her wrists.

She stared, turning her hand this way and that, as though by doing so she could will them away. They were dark, purple in some places, greenish-yellow in others, and smack in the middle of them were angry red scrapes that could only be rope burns.

"…Oh, bugger," she breathed, and winced--that word had gotten her into this mess in the first place. Was this real? Was she actually awake, or was he still mucking her about in her dreams?

She reached under her pillow for the frying pan--it was still there, however little good it had done. That movement set off all kinds of pain-signals; aches and twinges in places where there definitely shouldn't be any. Her neck was sore, in places tender to the touch, and she had a feeling she knew what _that _meant. And gods, his smell, that damnably bewitching spicy scent, was all over the pillow too… Eek.

And, almost as disturbing, her nerves were still thrumming with sensations that were anything but painful. Her memories of her dream were unfortunately clear, and while she might be annoyed this morning she definitely hadn't been protesting last night. Her face flushed, a combination of embarrassment and outrage warring within her brain. Gods, she'd said--and he'd done--and _she'd _done--and…oh, sod it all to hell.

Susan stood up, or tried to--no sooner had she made it out of bed than an overwhelming wave of dizziness washed over her, the floor seeming to lurch beneath her feet. Her vision greyed, and before she could sit back down she'd collapsed, hard, onto the floor.

She swore, but didn't attempt to move just yet. Sooner or later the room would see fit to stop spinning, and maybe when it did she wouldn't feel such a pressing urge to be sick. Cold stabbed through her, even as sweat broke out on her forehead and numbness took her limbs.

"…Bugger," she croaked. It had only been one night--just how much had he taken from her? How much _could_ he have taken, in just a single night?

…But it had been a very _busy_ night; that, she couldn't deny. Gods, had it ever…well, damn. Illness she could explain to the Gaiters, but the marks on her wrists and the love-bites on her neck she could not. Much as she didn't want to admit it, she had really only one course of action left to her.

She had to go to Granddad's.

_Right_, she thought, somehow managing to sit upright. _Because _this _is going to end well._

_------_

Teatime, unfortunately for him, didn't have a whole lot of options either. It really was rather depressing, how few people knew anything at all about incubi, and terribly frustrating that the few who did couldn't help him. So far as he could tell, no incubus had ever wanted to _refrain_ from killing their victim, so, short of stopping being with her altogether, he didn't know what to do.

He didn't want to stop, or the whole point of keeping her alive would be moot. His list of resources was growing short, however, and he had a feeling he was going to have to go to the one person he did _not _want to see. Ever again.

However much he didn't want to, Teatime nevertheless found himself standing outside Mrs. Cake's neat, shabby house, his eye twitching slightly as he regarded it. If _she _couldn't help him, he'd be well and truly buggered, but something told him she could. And would.

He knocked, and was unsurprised when she seemed unsurprised to see him.

"Oi thought you'd be here," she said, letting him in. "Come on, then, let's talk."

Teatime blinked at her. "But how did you--_I _didn't know I was coming here until half an hour ago."

Mrs. Cake fixed him with a beady eye. "Precognition, young man. Now get on in here before I change my mind.

Shrugging, he stepped inside, gazing distrustfully at the doilies and chintz. "If you knew I was coming, you'll know why I'm here," he said, the tic under his eye growing more pronounced. "I need advice."

She gestured to one of the chairs in the sitting room, following with a kettle and two cups. "Oi know. And while I think I can help you, you're goin' to have to give me a damn good reason why I should.

Teatime considered this while she poured the tea, and finally said brightly, "I'm not going to go away, but I'd really like it if I could avoid killing her," he said. "Leaving her to keep her alive would defeat the purpose, you see. I _like _what I do with her, and if I kill her I can't do it anymore."

Mrs. Cake, who already thought him howling, barking mad, readjusted that diagnosis to included 'twisted as a tangled hosepipe'. "It doesn't bother you that she's not exactly volunteerin'?" she said at last.

Once again silence, as Teatime turned that over. "No," he answered. "She _likes _it, at least at the time, and she's starting to like me touching her even when she's awake. I don't see what's wrong with that."

_You really don't, do you?_ she thought. "So, Jonathan, my question is: where d'you see this goin'? In the long run, I mean."

He blinked. "I don't know. Why does it matter?"

"Because, you sick little man, if you're still goin' to kill her later on, I'm not helpin' you. No point in savin' her now if you're just goin' to get rid of her when you get bored with your, um, game." Brief though their meeting had been, Mrs. Cake _liked _Susan, and demented as Teatime was, she didn't despise him, either. She knew well how little chance Susan had of getting rid of him--she hadn't been kidding when she said incubi were damned hard to exorcise--but maybe she could learn to live around him, if he'd give up this notion of killing her. Of course Susan would be absolutely horrified if she knew what Mrs. Cake was thinking, but the good lady had learned long ago that what you can't get shut of, you've got to find a way of living with.

Once again Teatime sat in thoughtful silence. He'd never had to plan for the future before, but if he wanted to keep his toy he had to now--he had a hunch that lying to Mrs. Cake would be both stupid and rather pointless. She seemed like the kind of woman who could spot a lie as easily as he could.

"I won't kill her," he said at last, and beamed at her. "She's far too much fun, and I can't see myself getting _bored _with her." For a variety of reasons, most of which Mrs. Cake would _not _want to know about.

Mrs. Cake tapped her chin thoughtfully. "All right," she said. "But if you go back on your word, I'll know, and you won't like the results. You kill her and you'll be totally at sea, and _then _I can deal with you. Slowly."

Teatime had little doubt she could, and would. He gave her a sunny (if slightly twitchy) smile. "I promise," he said. "Now how do I keep her from dying?"

------

Stopping Time was not as easy as it normally was, but after a few failed attempts Susan managed it. Done properly, the Gaiters need never know she was gone--her family had spent quite long stretches in Death's land and come back to the same time they'd left.

Whistling for Binky was more difficult still, but it wasn't long before the white horse arrived--straight through the wall. Most unfortunately, Death was with him, having been on the rounds as usual. Susan groaned--she'd been hoping she wouldn't have to deal with him until she'd got to his house.

Death knew sickness when he saw it, but fortunately for Susan he couldn't identify just what was plaguing her--yet.

YOU ARE ILL, GRANDDAUGHTER. It was a statement, not a question.

Susan nodded. "I need to…get away for a while, Granddad. Just till I'm…better." She hoped desperately that he wouldn't recognize her various bruises for what they were, but she was lucky there, too--Death had zero understanding in those areas, unless he was specifically told. And even then, he didn't actually _get _it.

It is almost impossible for a skull to look concerned, but Death managed it. Susan had been ill perhaps once in her life--one of the advantages of her heritage was that many normal mortal sicknesses didn't touch her. If something was ailing her, it had to be bad indeed.

THAT IS PROBABLY A WISE IDEA, he said at last, helping her up and settling her on Binky. He dug out his spare cloak--her dressing-gown wouldn't be nearly warm enough, and in any case he had a hazy idea people weren't supposed to go out in public in them. Once everything was settled he urged Binky into a canter, leaving the Gaiters'--and the ground--behind.

For her part Susan, once they were airborne, felt no need to retain her tenuous hold on consciousness. True sleep--deep, untroubled sleep--took hold of her, as for once in her life she let someone else look after her.

------

"So let me see if I've got this straight," Teatime said. "If I feed some of this energy back to her, it'll replace what I'm taking?"

"Exactly. You've got enough--though I don't know where you got it, and I _really _don't want to know how--that you can cycle back some of the extra to her. Though givin' it back won't break her addiction, mind you." She paused. "Though somehow I don't think you'll mind that, will you?"

Teatime grinned happily. "Oh, not at all," he said. "Her addiction is half the fun."

Mrs. Cake sighed. "You see her again, you bring her here, all right? I want to talk to both of you together." This was shaping up to be a royal mess--hell, it already _was _a royal mess, but it looked like it was only going to get worse.

"All right." His sunny expression darkened into something unhappily thoughtful. "But…I think I made her sick last night. I didn't know how not to…what if I did? If I took too much, and it's made her sick?" Just as Susan had realized, it really had been such an _active _night--taking away her means to fight him meant she went under to her addiction much, much more quickly, and stayed there much longer. It had been fun at the time, but upon reflection was probably not such a good idea.

Mrs. Cake eyed him suspiciously. "If you did take too much--and I do _not_ want to know how you could've done it--you're goin' to have to leave her be for a few nights. You can't give back everything you've already pulled from her--the cyclin' will only keep the balance, not restore anythin'. Let her alone for a few days, till she regains her strength." _And maybe, if your habit's broken a few days, your attention span will shift to something else._

Teatime's face fell. "Leave her alone? For how many days?" How _boring_ would it be, to be without her that long? The only thing that made his day worthwhile was the thought of playing with her at night. Damn.

"Until she doesn't look sick anymore," Mrs. Cake said severely. "You'll know. Go…take up pottery or something." He looked so dismayed she wanted to laugh. "I don't think it'll kill you, lad. Whereas not waiting will kill _her_."

Teatime, still frowning unhappily, nodded. "All right. For a while." Only a little while…he _did _have self-control, he just didn't exercise it much. She was right; it _couldn't_ kill him, seeing as he was already dead, but it might wind up near-terminally dull.

He nodded to her and left, wondering just what the hell he was supposed to do now.

------

Susan woke--briefly--when Binky touched down on the graveled forecourt of Death's house. She tried to stagger on her own two feet and failed, rather spectacularly. Death caught her before she fell and she cursed, wondering how her legs had turned to over-cooked noodles.

Her consciousness once more bid farewell at that point, leaving Death to manhandle her inside. He didn't know what was wrong with his granddaughter, but he knew it couldn't be a normal illness, therefore someone was doing something to her. And, glands or not, that made him _angry_.

He settled her in Ysabell's old room and went to find both Albert and a cup of tea. The Duty could go hang for the rest of the day--he wanted to know what had happened to his granddaughter, and why.

Albert was, needless to say, quite surprised to see him, and even more surprised to hear why he was home.

"But she's never been sick a day in her life," he said. "Neither was Ysabell."

I KNOW. Death took the teapot with him. LET ME KNOW IF SHE WAKES.

He stalked off, knowing there was only one way he was going to figure this out.

------

Teatime, Mrs. Cake's words still fresh in his mind, wandered back to the Gaiters'. He'd figured out very quickly that ordinary people still couldn't see him unless he made them, but a passing vampire gave him a nod, so apparently the undead could. He wanted to see just how sick he'd made Susan, to gain some idea of how long he'd have to wait.

He found the Gaiters quite busy, with, for once, the children underfoot. It didn't take him long to figure out Susan wasn't there, and _that _annoyed him. Deeply.

What was bizarre was that they didn't seem to realize Susan was missing. Or, rather, they didn't seem to remember she'd been there at all--Mrs. Gaiter was talking about putting out an ad for a governess, while Gawain and Twyla romped happily through the nursery, ignoring lessons and household duties.

Teatime was bright enough that it didn't take him long to figure it out. He knew who Susan's grandfather was, after all--she must have packed off to Granddad's to recuperate, or something. _Dammit_, that wasn't _fair_. Even if he couldn't have played with her at night, he could have pestered her during the day…Boo.

Well, he'd just have to wait until she came back--he knew better than to try to get into Death's country. First off, he doubted he could, and second, he had no illusions as to what Death would do to him, should he get caught. Maybe he really _would _take up pottery….

------

Some time later Death was at his desk, his tea gone cold, reading Susan's biography. He'd thought the best way to find the source of her ailment would be to find it somewhere in her recent past, but…he certainly hadn't been expecting what he'd _found_.

Teatime? _Teatime_, that evil little monster of an Assassin? How had he found a way to become an incubus--how had he even _thought _of it? And to latch onto Susan… It was a damn good thing for Teatime that he hadn't tried to follow her, or Death would have made mincemeat out of his incubus-y soul.

Perhaps fortunately for Susan, Death's reaction to the idea was not what a normal person's would have been. He was terribly angry at the idea that Teatime had found a way to come back and exact revenge on Susan, but the particular method by which he was doing so was not particularly horrifying. Again, the whole lack-of-glands thing; not being human, he had no idea how especially humiliating such a thing would be for Susan. No, his anger was over the fact that someone was harming his granddaughter; the _type _of harm was more or less immaterial.

He slammed the book shut, somehow contriving to scowl. The undead were technically outside his province, but he was hardly going to sit idly by while that stroppy little monster slowly killed his granddaughter. He couldn't kill Teatime--again--but he _could _likely find some way of blocking him from ever seeing Susan again. And hopefully have the opportunity to thwack the living hell out of the twit in the process.

Albert hadn't come to find him, but Death laid the book aside and left to see Susan anyway. Asleep or not, he wanted to gauge just how much damage Teatime had done to her. He didn't want to think Susan would avoid coming here in such extremity, but then, humans were bizarre. Perhaps she had some personal reason for staying away.

She was still sound asleep when he reached her, but her face was already less pale. Her hair, clearly more restless than she, coiled and twisted angrily, as though all the fury she normally felt awake was finding outlet in her sleep. He knew his granddaughter well enough to realize his own anger couldn't hold a candle to Susan's rage--she seemed chronically annoyed _anyway_, and with all this added on top of it, it was a wonder she hadn't killed someone. Yet.

Death considered the problem a long, long while, and Susan slept on, crashed out as hard as a college student after a week of binge drinking. There had to be some way of exorcising an incubus…he wasn't used to dealing with demons, but he knew several people who were.

Finally he stood, leaving Susan to continue snoozing, and made his way to the kitchen.

ALBERT, I AM GOING OUT, he said, taking the scythe _and _the sword out of the umbrella stand. DON'T WAIT UP.

Albert, who knew his master well, made no comment. He hadn't been a wizard for nothing--he'd been in to check on Susan, and could read all the signs damn well. Best get her back on her feet soon, because just as he knew Death would go incubus-hunting, he knew _Susan_ would want to have the final say, as it were. And would probably be much messier about it than her grandfather could ever imagine.

He put another kettle on, and set about making some soup. Whatever stupid sod of a demon had attached himself to Susan, Albert almost felt sorry for him.

Almost.

-------

Nanny Ogg was engaged in her favorite pastime of terrorizing her daughters-in-law when Binky landed on her lawn. Nanny was witch enough to know Death wasn't paying an official visit--nobody in Lancre town was due to die any time soon, and anyway he had a preoccupied air that was not at all in character.

"Shoo," she said to the daughters-in-law, and they did so with some alacrity. "You'd better come in. I don't know why you're here, but I'm guessing it ain't a social call."

Death dismounted, leaving Binky to graze on the immaculate lawn. NO, he said, IT IS NOT. IF I MAY HAVE A WORD WITH YOU IN PRIVATE?

Nanny Ogg's cottage was, as always, immaculate, though Nanny herself never lifted a finger. Something extremely well-marinated was cooking in the oven, and a fresh pot of tea sat on the polished coffee table. She gestured to the spare chair and Death sat, looking like an adult who had tried to cram into a child's play-chair.

Most people would be unnerved by an unexpected visit from Death, but Nanny had seen him enough at various death-beds to know he wasn't at all what you might call fearsome. Normally, anyway. However poker-faced a skull might seem, he managed to communicate all kinds of rage, and Nanny raised her eyebrows, wondering what in the seven hells could piss off the Grim Reaper.

She didn't press, however; she knew better than that, too. Instead she filled her pipe, packed down the tobacco, and lit it, shaking out the match--small, comfortable tasks, filling the air with sweet smoke and the acrid sulfur of the match.

YOU HAVE SOME EXPERIENCE WITH DEMONS, Death said at last, once Nanny had really settled in. THE UNDEAD ARE OUTSIDE MY PROVINCE…I SEEK ADVICE.

_That _did surprise her. Not only that Death would want advice about demons--he was right, they weren't part of his job description--but that he would come to _her_. And, really, that he'd have any problems in that area in the first place.

"What kind of demon are we talkin' about?" she said at last. She'd noted his use of 'undead'; most demons weren't undead, because they'd never been _alive_. Surely Death knew this, so whatever he was dealing with had to be a…special case.

AN INCUBUS, Death returned, as impassively as possible. I WISH TO KNOW HOW TO EXORCISE ONE.

Nanny coughed on her smoke ring. "An _incubus?_ Well, I haven't heard tell of one've those in years. What's your problem, exactly?"

ONE HAS ATTACHED HIMSELF TO MY GRANDDAUGHTER, he said, and only the set of his bony shoulders betrayed any emotion at all--_they _said he was furious, however calm his voice might be.

Nanny was silent a moment, her brain processing all this with a ferocity most people--most who didn't know her well, anyway--wouldn't have believed possible. While another person might have gotten hung up on the 'Granddaughter?' bit, Nanny's mind assimilated without batting a metaphorical eyelash, and seized instead on the relevant part.

"Sorry?" she said at last. "You're telling me an incubus has latched onto _your_ granddaughter? What, is he weird in the head?" Any demon that would have truck with Death had to be out of his mind, though it surprised her greatly that any scion of Death's would be susceptible to such a creature in the first place.

HE HAS. AND HE IS. AND AT PRESENT I HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO GET RID OF HIM. Death scowled, fingers clicking on the handle of his scythe.

"Well, how'd he even find her?" Nanny asked. Some kinds of incubi were easier to get rid of than others--it all depended on what sort of link they had to their victim.

HE WAS MORTAL. Death's scowl deepened, somehow. SHE KILLED HIM WITH A FIREPLACE POKER. THE BOY WAS COMPLETELY OUT OF HIS MIND--HOW HE BECAME AN INCUBUS, HOW HE KNEW WHAT AN INCUBUS _WAS_, I DO NOT KNOW. REALLY, SO FAR AS THAT GOES, I DO NOT CARE--ALL I WISH TO KNOW IS HOW TO GET RID OF HIM.

Well, _bugger_. "That…could be a problem," Nanny said thoughtfully. "See, there's different kinds of incubi, and some've 'em are a damn sight easier to get rid of than others. Demons like what you're sayin'--ones who've got the tie of mortality to their victim…so far as I know, you can't get rid of 'em. I only ever heard it tried of once--and this was with a succubus, mind, but same situation--and while the exorcism worked, it killed the poor bloke in the process."

She puffed on her pipe, the coals crackling in the sudden quiet. "Where is she now? Your granddaughter?

IN MY COUNTRY. RESTING. WHATEVER HE IS--HOWEVER HE IS BOUND TO HER--HE CANNOT FOLLOW HER THERE. Death did _not _look happy with her words, but Nanny knew he'd do her no ill. It wasn't in his nature.

"Well, that's a mercy at least," she said. "Give the poor girl some time to get her strength back. Once she's had a few days' rest, you bring her to see me, all right? Might be I can get a good look at her, at what kind've ties she's got on her, and mebbe do something about it. I ain't making any promises," she added, "but I'll certainly try."

THANK YOU, MRS. OGG. Death stood. I APPRECIATE YOUR TIME.

Nanny would have helped anyway--she was a helping creature--but her fascination with this particular case went well beyond normal witch's concerns. This was most definitely a challenge _no _witch had ever faced, and…well, she could make history. Or break it, but she'd burn that bridge when she came to it.

"You come back soon," she said, as Death stepped outside and collected Binky. "And you feed up that granddaughter of yours--nothing helps a body get better than soup and a good drink."

With that in mind Death left, both more troubled and more relieved than he had arrived. If Mrs. Ogg was right, and Teatime couldn't be gotten rid of, Susan might well have to live out the rest of her life in her grandfather's house. She would _not_ like that idea, not at all…there had to be some other way. Death did not, of course, fear anything, but the idea of facing the wrath of Susan made him think very hard about the idea of dread.

------

Heee! Once again, I _told _you it got worse. And next chapter even more so. HOORAY BEER.


	6. You Can't Always Get What You Want

Perpetrator's Note: Just when it looks like everything is about to go wahooni-shaped, Nanny Ogg and Mrs. Cake show up to…make it worse, mostly. XD Also, as this story is pre-_Thief of Time_, Nanny has not met Susan before now. Kudos to anyone who catches the Rolling Stones reference. :P

------

When Susan finally woke up, the worst of her aches had subsided, and she no longer felt like the room was spinning like a gyroscope. She was weak, and tired, and _hungry_, and was wondering if she cared to test her legs when Albert rapped on the door.

"Awake yet?" he called.

Oh, gods. Of all the people she didn't want to deal with right now…argh. "More or less," she replied, sitting up as best she was able and pulling her sleeves well down over her wrists, her hair curling down to hide her neck. Albert wasn't half so dense about human nature as Grandfather--he'd have a much better idea just what all her weird little injuries _were_.

"Good. Got you some lunch." He came in carrying a folding card table and a tray of soup, toast, and tea, and amazingly had refrained from frying any of it. "The master's out, but he ought to be back in time for supper." Oh, merciful Albert, he'd brought mint tea, by the smell of it. _And _a pot of honey.

"Where's he gone?" she asked, pouring a cup and spooning in the honey. "Back out on the Duty?"

Albert pulled the cutlery out of a random pocket and set it on the table. "Nah, I think he's off to find your incubus."

Susan choked, spraying tea all over the bed and herself and snorting a great deal of it out her nose. "He _what?_" she said, the words squeezed out between wet, hacking coughs. "I--ju--he--_what?_" How the HELL did Granddad know that--and how did _Albert_ know? Oh, gods, this was too damn much. Letting Teatime kill her would almost have been worth it--it would've spared her this particular humiliation.

"Your incubus," Albert said, as matter-of-factly as he could. "Gone out to hunt him down, I think. You just rest up, and maybe by the time the master's caught the bugger, you'll be well enough to have a go at him with the scythe yourself."

Susan, still coughing, could not respond right away. "Wait, wait, back up a minute," she said at last. "Where did this whole incubus idea come from?"

Albert leveled a Look at her. "I'm not stupid, you know," he said. "I know the signs when I see 'em. Your granddad don't, but I wasn't a wizard just so's I could wear the pointy hat."

Susan covered her face with her hands. "Gods, kill me now and save me the rest of this humiliation."

"Nah, you'll get over it," Albert said, as soothingly as was possible--which, as he was Albert, wasn't much. "'S not normally how it all works, anyway."

"Not how _what_ normally works?" Susan groaned, her voice muffled by her hands. The tea had grown cold and sticky, and she just _knew_ it would take three or four washes to get the blasted stuff out of her hair.

"Oh, you know, the birds and the bees and all that."

Susan's eyes slammed open, staring horrified through the latticework of her fingers. "…You didn't just say that. Please tell me you didn't just say that."

Albert coughed. "Well, you know, you're at the age where _someone_ ought to give you the Talk, and the master…doesn't get it."

"You…" She couldn't finish. Out of all the ridiculous, embarrassing, _infuriating_ things that had happened to her in the last few days, this was the straw that broke her temper.

"First off, Albert, I _am _going on twenty-three, and second--" she sputtered, casting wildly about for a second, "and second, _hello? _Incubus infestation? I already _know_ all that. And even if I hadn't, I BLOODY WELL DO NOW." Oops, she hadn't even _meant_ to summon the Voice. "In _great detail_. So please, for the love of gods, spare me the disturbing paternal lecture, lest I do something foolish like dump the soup tureen over your head."

Albert blinked. He'd shot backward when she used the Voice, and when he opened his mouth to argue, one look at her face made him shut it again. Ysabell had had a spectacular temper, but she wasn't a patch on her daughter--ill or not, Susan could probably take him apart. Using very few tools.

"I was just trying to help," he said at last, contriving to look aggrieved. "I mean, your parents dead and all--how was I to know you'd already…." Once again, her expression halted him cold. "Oh, all right, I'll bugger off. Catch me trying to give you advice ever again…."

He wandered off, muttering, and Susan flopped back against the pillows with an inarticulate snarl. Her gut reaction, whenever anything embarrassed or upset her, was to get angry, and she didn't try to stop it now. She wanted to hit something--well, some_one_--but as that wasn't currently an option, she settled for eating her soup. It was beef, and delicious, and following it with several cups of (thankfully not spewed) tea helped calm her temper a little. The warmth of both soup and tea was relaxing, and made her want the greater warmth of a bath.

When she stood her legs held her, which was a mercy, and she made it to the bathroom with only a few stumbles. Her head still swam slightly, and she sat on the cool tile with her head against her knees while the massive tub filled. Granddad didn't have any bath salts, but here they were hardly necessary--she just got a fresh bar of soap out of the cupboard, a fresh flannel out of the closet, and settled in for a good long soak.

Gods, hot water…it was like a little slice of heaven, in a bath. It soothed her aches and twinges, to the point where even her hair relaxed, floating gently like some unearthly sea creature.

It also allowed her to think undistracted. She highly doubted Granddad would actually be able to do anything about Teatime himself, but once she'd recovered her strength enough, perhaps _she _could. He was tied to her, after all, and in her experience all knots could be broken sooner or later. Maybe she could be like that Ephebian bugger, the one that solved the giant knot by slicing it in half. Now _that _would be satisfying.

Now that Susan was away from Teatime's influence, she could regard the whole matter with some measure of detachment--not much, but some. _Someone_ had told him how to do all this--probably the same someone who'd been siphoning off the life force Teatime had taken from her--and she cursed the bastard with every expletive she could think of. He'd given Teatime a way to take away her control, and _that _more than anything was unforgivable.

Her addiction…was the worst part. The fact that he could make her like what he did to her, that he could make her want it, infuriated her past the point of all reason. It disturbed her greatly, that even awake he had a healthy chance of suborning her will… Argh.

At least she could relax, for now. Embarrassing as the whole situation was, she didn't have to deal with it directly for a while, and could sleep sound in the knowledge that there would be nobody in her dreams but her.

For now.

------

Teatime was not terribly difficult for Death to find. Death could find _anyone_, demon or not, and he finally tracked him down in, of all places, Chalky the troll's warehouse. He was working a pottery wheel with his foot, and glaring at something that was probably meant to be a vase.

He looked up when Death cleared his throat, or what would have been his throat, if he'd had one. Teatime was just mad enough that even in his present incarnation, he had no fear of Death--less so than he had before, even, because after all he was technically already dead.

"I thought you'd come by sooner or later," he said. His normal happy demeanor was rather dampened at the moment, mainly by the clay, which wasn't at all cooperating. "You know, I really, really hate pottery. I can't wait until Susan comes back, so I can actually have something _fun _to do."

Death stared at him. It was amazing how, without a proper face, he was able to scowl like thunder at Teatime, who returned the stare with a rather manic grin. YOU, he said, ARE COMING WITH ME. And without waiting for Teatime to even open his mouth Death seized him by the collar, dragging him away from his would-be project and loading him atop Binky without further preamble.

"But--hey, I was supposed to go see Mrs. Cake today," Teatime protested, as Death absently twisted his arm behind his back to discourage any attempts at escape.

MRS. CAKE? Death knew well who she was, and what she did for a living. WHY MRS. CAKE?

"Susan went to see her--do you mind? That really is quite painful, and not very nice of you. She said--"

_SUSAN_ WENT TO SEE _MRS. CAKE?_ Death was rather taken aback. _SHE MUST HAVE BEEN DESPERATE,_ he thought. WELL. PERHAPS IT WOULD BE BEST IF SHE CAME WITH US, THEN.

"Came with us where?"

YOU'LL SEE SOON ENOUGH. Death gathered Binky's reigns in one hand, the other still clamped around Teatime's wrist like a vice. THOUGH YOU PROBABLY WON'T LIKE IT.

------

Gods, the bath had been nice. Clean and mostly relaxed, swathed in a dressing gown with her hair hanging in wet tendrils down her back, Susan now sat in Death's office, flipping through Teatime's biography. The description of his death was most emphatic, but instead of ending there as it ought to, the few blank pages were filled with bits and snippets of sentences. Very few of them were whole--the ones that were seemed to be his thoughts, as though whatever went on in his head was more alive than his shade.

She was not at all surprised that his thoughts were all over the place, swinging wildly like an out-of-control carnival ride. They followed no logical path, but skipped from subject to subject in the blink of an eye….

…except where she was concerned.

"Oh, bugger," she said aloud, very softly. It was one thing to guess at what was going on in that shattered brain of his, but to _see_ it was much, much worse than anything she could have imagined. Susan had known his motives for the torment he meted out were far from those of a normal person,. But only now, reading them, did it hammer home to her that he really, truly, completely _did not know what the hell he was doing. _As she had suspected, the idea had not been his at all, and it was only after…well, after the first time…that he came to enjoy what he did with her for what it was.

_Put the book _down_, Susan. Right now, _her common sense literally screamed at her. She knew she should--that reading on would only be more disturbing--but, much like a carriage pile-up, she could not drag her horrified eyes away. What he thought while…visiting her…was at once twisted and demented beyond all reason, and yet…

And yet he was so _naïve_. He had none of a normal adult's thoughts and lusts and selfish desires. To him it really _was _a game, and moreover--oh, _gods--_moreover, he was starting to like the game more than the initial idea that had spawned it. Teatime had become an incubus to kill her, but now, it seemed, he didn't want to.

This, really, was much worse than she'd thought. However…hmm. If it _was _his game, perhaps all she had to do was make it no fun. It was worth a try, at least, and at this point she didn't know what other options she had.

------

Death made one stop along the way, to collect a Mrs. Cake who would have been highly indignant if she hadn't been expecting him. Quite thankfully there was no limit to the amount of people Binky could carry, even if getting him to do it required a bit of folding of the rubber sheet of the universe.

They lighted on Nanny Ogg's lawn, nearly knocking over one of the obscene lawn ornaments. The three of them made their way up to the doorstep, Death still gripping Teatime's wrist like a vice while Mrs. Cake looked around with interest.

If Nanny was surprised to see the three of them, she gave no sign. She hadn't been expecting Death to return so soon, and she certainly hadn't expected the bizarre little retinue he'd brought with him. Still, Nanny was nothing if not a good hostess, and in short order her three guests were seated at the kitchen table, on which a tray of biscuits and a huge pot of tea had been arranged.

"Oi must say, I like what you've done with the place," Mrs. Cake said, eying the small army of knickknacks with approval. "What with my household, I can't have too many breakables."

Nanny grinned, filling her pipe. Death watched, fascinated, as the two ladies bantered back and forth--they hadn't been here five minutes, and already it seemed Nanny and Mrs. Cake had known one another for years. It was yet another odd human thing he felt he could never understand.

Teatime, meanwhile, was staring about with avid, and rather horrified, interest. He'd never seen so many cheap, gimcrack souvenirs in one place before. It was rather disturbing even to him.

"So, is this the incubus?" Nanny asked, breaking both Teatime and Death's reverie. "My, you are a bit of a well-set up lad, aren't you?"

Teatime blinked, momentarily nonplussed. He'd seen a lot of things in the course of his life (and death), but nothing could have prepared him for Nanny Ogg's cheerful leer.

"If he wasn't a bloody incubus, he wouldn't be half bad," Mrs. Cake agreed. Both women were staring at him, sizing him up as they would a flank steak. Perhaps fortunately the gist of their conversation passed right over his head--as it was, he simply grinned cheerfully back at them, the grey glass of his eye glowing in the slanting sunlight.

"Pity about that." Nanny shook her head. "All right, my lad, I think we need to talk. Pity your young lady isn't here, but we can't have everything, I suppose."

Death considered this, while Teatime's grin grew slightly uncertain--what were these two old women planning? And, perhaps more importantly, did he _really_ want to know? Cracked as he was, he had enough sense to realize that when two old biddies start plotting, it rarely bodes any good for anyone.

I WILL SEE IF SHE IS WELL ENOUGH TO JOIN US, Death said, standing up. YOU--he pointed at Teatime--BEHAVE YOURSELF.

Teatime gave him a look of happy, helpful innocence, that fooled nobody.

"Don't you worry," Nanny said, in an amiable tone that had a note of stubborn steel beneath it, "we'll keep an eye on him. Won't we?"

"Of course." Mrs. Cake nodded comfortably. "He's not goin' anywhere."

GOOD. Death cast Teatime a baleful glare, and left him to the mercy of the women.

Nanny shook her head, refilling her pipe. "Would it kill him to use the door?"

"_I _tried to kill him once," Teatime said brightly. "I would have, too, if Susan hadn't killed me first."

Nanny eyed him speculatively, while Mrs. Cake rolled her eyes. "Is that what this is all about?" Nanny asked. "Revenge?"

"Started out that way," said Mrs. Cake, before Teatime could answer. "Now he doesn't want to kill her. Can't blame him--she's very pretty. Lad's got good taste, at least. Problem is, however much he enjoys her company, he don't really understand what you might call the finer points of the whole thing. His reasonin' in that area's a bit…off."

"It's usually like that." Nanny took a meditative draw at her flask of brandy. "Person discovers a bit late in life how much fun their own body can be, they can wind up goin' a bit overboard. Though my guess, seein' our lad here, is that he wouldn't have half so much fun if he wasn't playin' with _her._"

Teatime watched them, fascinated. He wasn't used to being talked about as though he wasn't in the room, nor was he accustomed to being around anyone who could read his mind and motives so easily. Half the time _he _didn't know why he did things; to hear all that he'd figured out about the true intention behind his recent actions was…novel, and almost disturbing.

His ruminations were interrupted by Death, who had arrived back in what had to be record time. He had with him not only Susan--Albert, the raven, and the Death of Rats had all crowded onto Binky, and trooped now into the kitchen.

"Well now, we've got the entire family," Mrs. Cake muttered, watching as the odd little party somehow squashed along one side of the table. Susan, she noticed, was nearly as white as her hair, with dark shadows under her eyes that were only made more obvious by the severe black of her dress. Oh, she'd been sick, and she still was, but even a blind monkey could have seen that she was also severely angry. The glare she leveled at Teatime ought to have blistered paint, but it had little effect on him. He smiled happily back, and Nanny had to catch Susan's hand before she could pick up the teapot and hurl it at him.

"Now now, that's not going to accomplish anything," she said amiably, grinning her almost-toothless grin. "All right, I don't know half of you, so let's get the introductions out of the way. I'm Nanny, I've got fifteen children, and I wouldn't mind having an incubus myself." She gave Teatime a cheerfully lascivious grin, which even he found unnerving.

Introductions went all around, until they reached the Death of Rats, who chittered angrily at Teatime and bit him on the finger.

"Oh, well said," Albert muttered, as Teatime yelped. Susan smiled in grim satisfaction.

"All right then," Nanny said. "Seems we've got quite a conflict of interest going on here. Jonathan, what exactly is it you want?"

Teatime, who had edged slightly away from Nanny, pointed at Susan. "Her, of course." Susan scowled.

"And Susan, what is it _you_ want?" Nanny prompted.

"What _I _want is for Teatime to drop dead," she said acidly. "Preferably with something sharp through his chest."

I WOULD LIKE TO ARRANGE THAT, Death put in. IF IT COULD BE AT ALL POSSIBLE.

Nanny and Mrs. Cake exchanged a knowing glance, a glance that nobody, not even Teatime, liked. It was a look of conspiracy--the sort of conspiracy that was usually unpleasant for everyone involved.

"Well, we can't always get what we want," said Nanny, briskly. "But sometimes we can get what we need. What we need _here _is compromise."

"Compromise?" Susan and Teatime chorused, dubiously.

COMPROMISE? Death echoed.

SQUEAK EEK EEK. The Death of Rats banged his scythe against the table.

"He says, 'We don't need no stinking compromises'," the raven translated.

"I don't want to _compromise_," Teatime said, petulantly. "I'm having fun with things as they are."

"_I _don't want to compromise, either," Susan protested. "I want the bastard to go back where he came from."

Teatime leaned forward to look at her, hurt. "But Susan, we were having such _fun_," he said. "You know you'd miss me if I left." He gave her a cheerful, winning smile. "I always enjoy visiting you, and from the sounds you make I think you do, too."

Silence followed this, for maybe five seconds. It broke when Susan, her face gone even whiter with rage, reached for the teapot before Nanny could stop her, and hurled it full-force at Teatime's face.

He leaped backward like a scalded cat, crying out in inarticulate shock and not a little pain as he wiped the steaming liquid from his eyes. The iron in the teapot hurt more than the tea itself, and as the pot had hit him square in the forehead it sent him reeling.

Susan, with a smile of almost unholy satisfaction, sat back in her chair. "Really, Teatime," she said sweetly, "you did _so _sound as though you enjoyed that."

Even the raven stared at her. The Death of Rats, who was quicker to recover than the rest of them, squeaked in what could only be laughter, doing a small victory dance across the table.

"That was vicious, my girl," Nanny said after a moment. She glanced at Teatime, who seemed momentarily too stunned to move. "Violence ain't the answer, at least in a domestic spat."

"Oi agree," Mrs. Cake put in. "You're not gonna solve your differences by hittin'. Or, you know, throwin' things at each other."

"Well, I can see their relationship will never be dull," Nanny said, shaking her head.

"But it makes _me _feel better," said Susan, before her brain caught up with her ears. "Wait, _domestic spat?_ _Relationship?_ What, in the name of all hells, do you mean by that?"

"You're not suggesting we ought to allow this to continue, are you?" asked Albert, speaking for the first time. "I don't bloody think so!"

Susan never thought she'd feel gratitude towards Albert, but she did now. She herself was still too floored to say anything.

WE CAME HERE TO GET _RID_ OF HIM, NOT TO GIVE THEM…WHAT WORD AM I LOOKING FOR, ALBERT?

"I think you mean couples' counseling, Master," Albert supplied. "Which ain't gonna happen."

BECAUSE THEY'RE NOT A COUPLE, Death said firmly.

"And never will be. Ever. In life," Susan added.

SQUEAK. The Death of Rats glared.

Nanny and Mrs. Cake shared a long-suffering look. "I dunno," Nanny said thoughtfully, glancing at Teatime. "Here, have a hanky--" She tossed him a large napkin. "They could both of them do a sight worse. And he's technically a demon, and immortal, after all…she wouldn't have to worry about bein' a widow, and it isn't likely they'd run across anything nasty he couldn't deal with…."

Susan, Teatime, and Albert choked in unison. Death didn't, but only because he lacked a throat.

"I didn't just hear that," said Susan, her hands over her eyes. "Oh gods, tell me I didn't just hear that. For the sake of my own _sanity_, tell me you didn't _really _just say that."

"_Widow?_" Albert demanded, grasping the crucial point rather more easily than Susan. "Now, you wait just a minute, you interfering old baggage--"

Teatime, speaking for the first time since Susan had brained him with the kettle, interrupted him thoughtfully. "Widow? Does that mean I'm supposed to marry her?"

"_NO!_" The word came in chorus, reverberating with the ear-numbing resonance of double-Death Voices.

"I don't know," Mrs. Cake said slowly. "It'd have problems. Granted, so does any other relationship."

Nanny nodded. "As I said, they could both do worse. And they'd certainly _look _good together…"

Susan twitched. She literally twitched. "OH GODS SHUT UP." She hopped to her feet, swaying slightly, and gripped the edge of the table for support. "I don't think you two understand this," she said, with an incredulous look at the conspiring grannies. "I want to get _rid _of him. You know, make him go away? Forever? Can you or can you not help me?"

I DO NOT THINK SUSAN WOULD WISH TO LIVE OUT THE REMAINDER OF HER LIFE IN MY COUNTRY, Death interjected. WHICH, IF YOU CANNOT CUT HER FREE OF TEATIME, SHE WILL HAVE TO DO.

"Doesn't appreciate fried pudding, she doesn't," Albert muttered, somewhat unnerved by the prospect of Susan as a permanent houseguest.

SQUEAK.

"The rat says he'll keep her company," the raven translated.

"Oh, _gods_," Susan groaned, as the implication of what living full-time in Death's house would mean. "…I don't have to deal with this," she said. "Granddad, I'll send Binky back once I've gotten home."

"Now, now, sit down." Nanny took Susan's wrist, gently urging her back into her chair. "I'm sure we can figure this out somehow. Evadne, you talk to them while I have a word with our lad out back." She rose and guided the still-confused Teatime out of the kitchen, leaving the others to the dubious mercies of Mrs. Cake, who folded her hands and eyed them all thoughtfully.

"All right," she said. "Now Susan, you haven't got anybody you're sweet on, do you? Because if you did, you might be able to break this thing. And if not…well, he's an Assassin; at least he could earn a living."

Susan was, for once, lost for words.


	7. You Belong to Me, My Snow White Queen

Perpetrator's Note: I almost feel sorry for Teatime in this chapter. Almost. Nobody, not even a deranged Assassin-turned-sex demon, should have to discuss matters of the heart (and related organs) with Nanny Ogg. Susan et al don't fare much better with Mrs. Cake, mind you--the collusion of these good ladies is going to make everyone involved wish they were dead. Or, you know, dead again.

------

"All right, my lad, you've obviously figured out the physical end of things, so I don't think I'll have to lecture much on _that_ score." Nanny had taken a seat on a varnished garden bench, while Teatime, after casting the garden a distrustful glance, took up residence on a wrought-iron stool. Like most city-dwellers, he instinctively distrusted nature, even when "nature" was represented by a velvet lawn and flawless flowers. "Not much, but probably some, just 'cause I'm an old lady and I want to."

She lit her pipe, smiling in the misty way reserved for those freewheeling down Memory Lane. "Been a while since I had to explain all this to my own kiddies. No, it's the rest of it we've got to work on--what you might call the not-physical. It's very important, if you don't want the girl to snub you like a blossom in the frost. A little courtin' will do wonders."

"Courting?" Teatime asked. He'd heard the word somewhere, but he'd never known what it meant--nor had he cared, really. "What, like, give her presents? What kind of presents?"

"Flowers, chocolate, and jewelry," said Nanny. "There can be other stuff later, but those are the big three at the beginning. You're goin' about the whole thing backwards, but then again so did I, most of the time. The trick is to get her to realize you're not just tryin' to get her dress off."

Teatime frowned, puzzled. "I don't really have to _try_ to get her dress off," he said. "I mean, hardly at all. Is that bad?"

"…In this case, yes." It wouldn't have been if it was Nanny, but Susan…was something else entirely. "Look, you like her, don't you?"

"Of course," Teatime grinned, on firmer ground now. "She's _mine._ And I want to keep her."

"…Good enough, I suppose," Nanny said, eying him as she puffed on her pipe. "Could be better, but we can work on that, I think. Anyway, you'd like to make her happy, wouldn't you?"

Teatime considered this carefully. "It would make my life easier, yes. She's so _cranky_ when she's awake…if she was happy, maybe she wouldn't throw things at me so often."

Nanny regarded him, at once frustrated and fascinated--Mrs. Cake had been right when she said his motives were skewed. "See, lad, that right there is what we call _wrong_," she said. "You shouldn't want to make her happy just so she quits braining you."

Teatime frowned again. "I shouldn't?" He actually looked pitiable. "Why should I, then?"

This might be difficult, Nanny thought. He was too cracked to understand normal human affection--his fondness for Susan was more that of a child with a favored plaything than anything else. It would take some work to change that, if it even _could _be changed. "You should want to make her happy because you like her," she said at last. "And because, if she's happy, she might actually start to want you around. And if she wants you around, she will indeed quit throwing things at you."

Teatime mulled this over. Did he _want _her to want him around? Part of what made what he took from her fun was the fact that he was _taking_ it. He might not like her annoyed when she was awake, but he did so enjoy infuriating her at night. Well, he amended, at least at the _beginning _of the night; she certainly wasn't irritated later, nor did he want her to be. And yet….

…And yet, he hadn't been joking when he told Nanny how much easier his life would be, if Susan liked him. He didn't know that he wanted to actually make her happy, per se--that would rather defeat the purpose. A large part of the whole exercise was still to punish her, and if he was trying to make her _happy_ it was clear something had gone wrong. Very wrong.

Nanny seemed to guess his thoughts. "If you don't want to make her happy, you might as well throw in the towel and have done with it," she said. "If you keep on thinkin' of this as revenge, even if only a little, she'll pack off to her granddad's and you'll never see her again."

Well, he certainly didn't want _that_. "You think she'd really do that? Go away and leave the Disc forever?" What an appalling thought--he'd grown almost as addicted to her as she was to him, and if she left forever… No. He couldn't let her do that.

"She will if you don't give her a reason to stay," Nanny retorted, knocking the ashes of her pipe on one of the lascivious gnomes. "And I'm sorry, lad, but as far as this girl's concerned, what you do with her at night ain't going to be reason enough."

…Dammit. Well, here was an unpleasant choice--did he keep on tormenting her, and risk driving her somewhere he couldn't follow, or did he give up the punishment aspect so he could keep her? The idea of a happy Susan galled him; he'd started this whole thing to make sure she _wasn't _happy. He wanted to piss her off, but if he succeeded too well he'd lose her, possibly forever.

He turned the thought over, searching for some way of making it acceptable. He certainly didn't want to be doing anything _nice _for her--ah, wait, that might work. If she was happy--if she came to like him--he would own her. Well, all right, physically at least he already did own her reactions, but if he could get her mentally as well… That would be mean. Very, very mean. And that made it all okay.

"You think I could make her like me?" he asked at last. "Really truly?"

"It's possible," conceded Nanny. "But you're going to have to work on it. Hard."

"Oh, I'm _good _at hard," said Teatime, blithely innocent of how potentially wrong that sounded. Nanny managed to avoid snorting, but when he added, "Most Assassins are, you know" she gave up and burst out laughing.

"You're one in a million, my lad," she said, and did not add _and there's probably a reason for that_. He might be cracked as an old mixing bowl, but everyone had to find someone sooner or later, and there were worse husbands than an incubus. The fact that Susan would eat her own foot before even considering such an idea was dismissed as immaterial. "Anyway, that out of the way, I think it's time we discussed what you might call _technique. _You've got an advantage in that she's prob'ly already addicted to you touchin' her, but there's more to it than that. I'm guessin' you've had advice before now, but not from what you might call a woman's perspective."

Nanny grinned at him, a toothless grin of pure lechery. Teatime, who did possess some moiety of self-preservation, wondered if he could make it to the treeline if he fled. Somehow, despite the fact that he was young and fast and Nanny looked like she couldn't outdistance a squirrel, he rather thought he couldn't. _Eep._

_------_

Back in the cottage, Susan turned an accusing eye on Mrs. Cake. "You said you were going to help me get _rid _of him," she said, scowling. "What happened to finding a way of exorcising him?"

"That's just it," said Mrs. Cake. "Oi don't think you can. I've turned it over upside down, backwards, and sideways, and I'm pretty sure he's bound to you for life. Unless, as you say, you go and stay with your granddad for the rest of eternity, Oi don't think you can get shut of 'im. So you might as well make the best of it."

Susan ran her hands through her hair, which was clearly as frustrated as she--it coiled and uncoiled angrily, curling down over her bruised wrists and twining around her arms. "How many times do I have to say it? I don't _want_ to 'make the best of it'. If I can't make him go away, I can't stay on the Disc. What part of that do you not understand?"

NO, Death said. SHE CAN'T. AND IF SHE HAS TO STAY FOREVER IN MY COUNTRY, SHE WILL _NOT_ BE PLEASED. AND WHEN SUSAN IS DISPLEASED, SHE TENDS TO SPREAD IT AROUND.

Her grandfather, while not normally astute in matters pertaining to the human psyche, had her dead to rights in that.

"Well, either way, she ought to go back to your land for a bit anyway. She's still sick, and probably will be for some time yet…meanwhile, we can see if we can't reach true compromise. There's got to be a way of makin' everyone happy." Mrs. Cake patted Susan's hand, smiling in what she probably hoped was an encouraging sort of way.

Susan frowned. So far as this situation went, there wasn't ANY possible way to make everyone happy--not unless all the participants involved underwent lobotomies. She was too tired to deal with this right now--too tired and too angry. Something of both must have shown on her face, for Mrs. Cake patted her hand again.

"Why don't you go get some fresh air, luv? Oi'll just have a word with your…family, here."

Susan, grateful for any excuse to escape this oh-so-awkward situation, needed no further urging. Being Susan, she didn't actually flee, but it was a close thing--fortunately, her legs were too wobbly and her head too dizzy for her to move with undue haste.

Once outside she eased her way around the corner, away from Nanny and Teatime, and sat on the flawless lawn with her chin on her knees. Naughty lawn ornaments notwithstanding, Nanny's garden was extremely peaceful, and she shut her eyes as she leaned back against the rough wall. The smell of fresh-cut grass was sweet and strong, and the sun beat warm on her pallid face, easing her strained nerves. _This _would be a much more restful place to recuperate than her grandfather's country, but here there would be no way of keeping Teatime at bay. It annoyed her immensely, that wherever she went on the Disc, sooner or later Teatime would be able to find her.

_Then again, he _does _want me to get better. _Gods, that was disturbing--even with all she knew of him, even with all she'd read in his biography, she still couldn't quite wrap her mind around the truly warped motivations that passed for his thought processes. Susan did not at all like the fact that he'd become so fixated on her, and she _really_ didn't like how she invariably reacted. It had gotten to the point that she was hesitant to touch him even when she was awake--if the kiss he'd given her in Mrs. Cake's garden was any indication, she had as little chance of resisting him as she did in her dreams.

"Sod it," she muttered, somehow standing. She wasn't half so dizzy now, and maybe a walk in the woods would clear her head. She had to get away from this…_mess_, even if only for a moment.

The forests of Lancre were the stuff fairytales are made of--the stuff of _real _fairytales, the kind where the hero gets eaten as often as not, and the wolf will likely dispense with formality and eat the little girl. It wasn't stupid, however; it knew enough that someone like Susan was best left alone.

_All right, mental forces. Rally already. This is your Koom Valley over here._

She didn't know how long she sat, resting in the bole of a massive hemlock, but her peace was abruptly shattered by an all-too-familiar voice, which said happily,

"You shouldn't wander off without telling anyone. You never know what you might run into, in a forest like this."

Susan's eyes snapped open, glaring up at Teatime. "Oh, I don't think I could come across anything worse than you," she retorted, rising slowly to her feet and stepping carefully around him. "Did you have a nice talk with Mrs. Ogg?"

"Oh, yes," Teatime said softly. "Very…instructive."

Susan thought briefly of the kind of 'instruction' Mrs. Ogg was likely to give, and shook her head. "That's nice," she all but growled. "Pity you won't get to put any of it to use. I am going _home_, and you can't follow me. Being stuck in Granddad's country until I die will be worth it, if it means you're stuck down here alone."

He didn't say anything in response--simply stared at her, a quizzical stare she'd already learned was a Bad Sign. She backed away, ready to either run or find something to brain him with, but she knew better than to take her eyes off him even for an instant. She knew, instinctively, that stopping Time wouldn't do a damn bit of good--like her, and Death, and gods knew how many other creatures, he wasn't bound by Time. There was a look in his one good eye she didn't like at all--a hungry, calculating look, such as she'd never seen before.

Without warning Teatime grabbed her, spinning her around and seizing both her wrists in one hand and pulling her back hard against him. His other hand reached up to tangle in her hair, jerking her head to one side, and before she could even begin to recover his mouth was on her neck, delivering a bite that was just this side of painful.

Susan cried out, a cry of mingled fury, pain, and almost terrible pleasure, trying to struggle and failing utterly. He released both wrists and hair, his arms wrapping around her in an embrace that would brook no escape. Always before he had left her some means to reciprocate, but not this time--now she could do nothing more than shudder as he sucked and bit hard enough to bruise her.

She somehow freed one arm, but before she could so much as claw at him he snatched her hand, fingers lacing with hers as he drew both their arms back around her. Her other arm met the same fate, her hands trapped by his as he pulled her tighter against him.

"I don't think you understand, Susan," he breathed against her ear. "You are _mine_. You belong to _me_, to play with whenever I want." He bit her again, melting her protest into an uninhibited moan. His fingers were still twined with hers, and though it was his hands that wandered over her, it was her touch she felt.

She should stop him--she couldn't stop him--she didn't _want _to stop him. His chest was solid and warm against her back, his mouth making her feel all sorts of things she knew she shouldn't, and as for the combined torture of their hands… Surely, surely she would die if he didn't stop….

…but she'd also die if he did.

It seemed he drew her torment out for an eon, driving her to a height of carnal anguish she hadn't thought possible. Teatime wanted to make Susan beg, but she'd left coherent speech behind some time ago, along with the pesky luggage of self-control. Her whimpers and moans were pleading enough, however, and for a moment he regretted that he didn't have more time.

He drove her closer and closer to the edge, until all in a moment the tension snapped. She didn't even try to hold back her cry of pure, unadulterated ecstasy, writhing in his arms as he bit her almost hard enough to draw blood. Dark light bloomed behind her eyes, and for a moment it felt like her senses had shattered into irreparable shards of complete euphoria.

Teatime held her still, his arms the only thing holding her upright. He smiled at the little shivers that ran through her, still filled with an almost childlike delight at what he could do to her. Her head had fallen back against his shoulder, her breath ragged and uneven, and when he pressed his lips to her temple she shuddered. Watching her afterward was just as fascinating (and satisfying) as watching her during, feeling her weak and drained against him.

"See?" he whispered, burying his face in her sweet-smelling hair. "Isn't it a fun game?"

Susan was nowhere near capable of answering, at least not in words. She didn't know how, but…he'd gotten way, _way _too good at that.

"Like I said," Teatime murmured, his hand coming up to stroke her hair, "you belong to me. _My _toy. And I won't let you forget it."

He sat, drawing her down with him as he leaned back against a tree, still holding her. While he didn't know how to make her happy--or even if he really wanted to make her happy, just yet--he _did _know how to make her addicted. If her addiction grew strong enough, she wouldn't be able to retreat to Death's country--she'd _need _what he did to her, and by association need him.

He deliberately didn't think about the fact that _he _already needed her.

------

HEE! I'm getting mean to _both_ of them, now. I honestly don't know just where the hell this is going in the end, but next chapter should definitely be...interesting. And that's all I'll say about that. XD


	8. Hydrocodone

Perpetrator's Note: And just when you--and I--thought it couldn't get worse… Blame for much of this chapter rests squarely on **Jillie Rose**--she's the one who mentioned Granny Weatherwax, and created a plot bunny that just had to breed. J The title chapter comes from the substance I was doped up on while writing much of it. XD

------

It is uncertain just what fresh hell might have passed between Susan and Teatime, had not Granny Weatherwax happened upon them.

It was far from uncommon to run across a random couple in the woods and fields beyond Lancre town, especially this time of year. Nanny usually turned a blind eye, but Granny was not so forgiving--many an incautious pair had felt the flat of her hand before now.

It didn't take her more than three seconds, however, to ascertain that this was not a normal situation. Granny wasn't a witch for nothing--she knew an incubus when she saw one, and if Susan was human Granny would eat her own hat. More, she realized what neither Nanny nor Mrs. Cake seemed to have grasped--whatever Teatime might want, Susan would like nothing better than to strangle him. Even dazed as she was, still half-drugged on a lazy haze of lingering euphoria, Granny could see the deeper fury that was just waiting to resurface. Grimly she marched up the pair, and poked Teatime hard with her broomstick.

"That's quite enough, young man," she said, scowling down at him. Teatime jumped, startled, his grip on Susan automatically tightening. "You let her up now, or you'll regret the day I was born."

There seemed to be an inherent flaw in that statement, but Teatime didn't try to puzzle it out. Even a sex demon has a certain amount of self-preservation instinct, and his was warning him now that crossing this odd old woman with drill-bit sapphire eyes would be a very, very _bad_ idea. He knew Susan wasn't even remotely capable of standing up right now, but he very wisely didn't let that stop him--the witch seemed to be staring straight through to the back of his skull, so as gently as he could he eased his way away from Susan. He wanted to say something clever, some amusing little quip to break the terrible tension Granny was generating like an electric field, but for once he couldn't think of a thing. Granny just _stared_, until finally Teatime's nerve broke, and he fled back toward Nanny's cottage.

"That's what I thought," Granny said, with a certain nasty satisfaction. "All right, my girl, I'm guessin' you've got a decent story behind this, don't you?" She helped Susan to her feet, catching her as she stumbled. "You just come along to Gytha's and--"

NO. The Voice came out without bothering to consult her, and Granny, normally almost wholly unflappable, nearly dropped Susan. "I mean, no, that's--_he's_ probably gone back there." Susan stumbled again, but her motor functions were very slowly returning. "It's a long story," she added, as Granny's eyebrows went up. "Just trust me, I do _not_ want to go back there."

Granny, for once, did not question. It was quite some distance to her cottage, but Susan managed it--simply walking helped dispel the weakness Teatime had wrought in her. She was _pissed_--not just because he'd caught her again, but because little sparks and trembles were still shooting through her.

Once in Granny's cottage she sat gratefully on a kitchen chair, watching while the witch put the kettle on and fished some tea leaves to pack in the strainer.

"So," Granny said, taking the other chair while the water heated, "supposing you tell me what's goin' on here."

Susan told her everything, starting with impaling Teatime with the poker and ending with the fiasco in the woods. For once she left nothing out--she knew, by some half-hidden instinct, that around Granny she had nothing to be ashamed of.

"And those two old ladies are missing the point entirely," she groaned, when she was finished. "They seem to think he's something I can _live_ with, like…like a termite infestation. Granddad and Albert are dead against it, thank gods, but Teatime has somehow convinced Mrs. Cake and Mrs. Ogg that his hanging around me is a _good_ thing." She rubbed her temples as Granny poured more tea.

"Well, they're half right about you gettin' rid of him," she said thoughtfully. "Damn hard to do, if not outright impossible. But…"

She stood, moving to her one bookshelf and taking down a heavy, ancient leather tome. Unlike Magrat she wasn't much for reading, but this cottage's predecessors had occasionally written down anything they thought truly important. She brought it back to the table and opened it carefully, turning the crackled pages until she found what she was looking for.

"Aha!" she said triumphantly. "Those two daft old biddies are helping you get shut of him, and they don't even realize it." She pushed the book toward Susan, who turned it right-side round and read,

_Daemons are Powerfulle, but not alle-Powerfulle. A Daemon of Nyte has but one Fatall flaw; if they shoulde Come to Cayre for their Victim, it wille Undo their Verri Existence._

She looked up at Granny. "You're saying if he falls in love with me, it'll kill him?" she asked. "Well, kill him _again?_" she amended.

Granny nodded, grinning the grin that was the terror of creatures for miles around. "Oh yes. He comes to love you, _you'll _be the one drainin' _him_." She didn't think it worth while to mention the sub-codicil tacked on to the bottom of the page, which added that the whole mess would only work provided the _victim_ didn't reciprocate. In Susan's case, the warning was hardly necessary.

There was a certain ironic and terribly vindictive satisfaction in that plan, but it itself had a crucially fatal flaw.

"It won't work." Susan drained the last of her tea. "Good idea, but it'll never happen."

"Why not?" Granny asked, pouring her another cup.

"Because he's completely and utterly insane. I don't think he's any more capable of human emotion than he is of flying." Susan swilled the tea around thoughtfully, gazing at the small floating tea leaves. "Probably less, in fact."

Yeah, that _could_ be a problem. Granny meditated a while in silence, and finally said, "Nothing's impossible. He's human--or used to be--and even a complete lunatic has to care about something. Might be you could trick him into thinkin he'd got _you_ to love _him._"

"I doubt it. He knows when people are lying." His instincts in that area were truly scary. "But there's got to be some way of goading him into it without his knowing. I just can't even begin to guess what it might be." She sighed. "And meanwhile, he's slowly killing me. Though apparently he wants to stop that because, and I quote 'I'm too much fun to play with'."

Granny's eyebrows went up. The word 'creepy' was not in her vocabulary, but if it had been she would've used it. As it was, the best she could manage was, "Well, he's weird in the head. I would guess--and you're not goin' to like this--it might be best if you stopped fightin' him. Just for a while--" she held up a pacifying hand, cutting off Susan's snarl of outrage. "Just long enough for him to let his guard down. You play like you're goin' along with it, it might just work. You said he's completely possessive--all you've got to do is make him even more so."

Susan twitched. "Yeah, but meanwhile he'll probably drain me to death. I don't care if he doesn't want to, I doubt he can help it."

"Trust me," Granny said grimly, standing and rinsing the teapot. "If anyone can find a way around something like that, it's Gytha. She'll want to make sure he don't kill you, if only so's she don't have to tell your young man he's got to leave off."

Susan wanted to say she doubted it, but the image of Nanny's cheerful, wrinkled, leering face made her keep silent. If _anyone_ could teach an incubus how to keep up his…goings-on…without killing his partner, it was her. Bloody brilliant.

She sighed, standing. "Tell me honestly, Mistress Weatherwax, does this have a chance in the seven hells of working?"

"'Course it does. Just probably not much more than that."

------

Back at the cottage, Death, Albert, the raven, and the Death of Rats were all deeply engrossed in conversation. Mrs. Cake wisely left them to it, wandering out to have a chat with Mrs. Ogg and Teatime.

I STILL DON'T SEE HOW IT COULD WORK, Death said, doubtfully.

"Look, Master, it's like she said--we find Susan some nice young lad, she gets attached, and the whole nasty string gets broken." Albert finished his roll-up and flicked a match. "'S easy."

Death considered this. Human or not, Albert clearly didn't have the same understanding of Susan as he did--finding a 'nice young lad' whom Susan wouldn't slap, laugh at, or drive away entirely was logically an almost impossible proposition. On the other hand, Mort and Ysabell had hardly gotten off to an auspicious start, and look how that had worked out.

I SUPPOSE, he said, standing and gathering his robes around him, IT'S WORTH A TRY.

"If she kills any of 'em, can I have the eyeballs?" the raven asked hopefully.

------

In the garden, Mrs. Cake was being treated to the unusual and admittedly amusing sight of an incubus getting a royal dressing-down.

"I _tole_ you to leave her alone, didn't ?" Teatime winced as Nanny thwapped him across the back of his head. "You've probably gone and made her all sick again, and now you're goin' to have to wait even longer. You leave her be, young man, or both Evadne and I'll have something to say about it. Go do somethin' useful while she's restin'--I b'lieve I gave you some advice about the whole courtin' business, didn't I?"

Teatime, confused and embarrassed all at once, nodded.

"Well, go on, then. You go take care of all that, and come back in a week. We'll see how she's feelin' then."

Teatime, not to put too fine a point on it, fled.

Nanny shook her head, sitting beside Mrs. Cake on the garden-bench. "I don't know, young people today seem a sight stupider than they were in my day. He'd be a bright enough lad, if he'd think with the right head."

"Weird, though," Mrs. Cake put in. "Definitely a bit odd."

"Ah, well, it'll just make life more interesting for both of 'em." Nanny sucked a boiled sweet, which was not a sight (or a sound) for the weak-willed. "I'll see if young Susan wants to stay here a while, to recover--I can keep her Jonathan away, if he decides to push his luck and come back early."

Mrs. Cake looked at her. "How d'you expect to do that?" she asked. "Nothin' can keep an incubus away. Oi thought that was the point."

There was a decidedly amused glint in Nanny's eyes. "Oh, trust me. He comes back here before time, he'll feel the flat of my hand _and _hers. And probably the kettle as well."

"Wouldn't mind seeing that," Mrs. Cake observed. "You think he'll make a complete pig's ear of it all?"

"Of course," Nanny laughed. "They always do. If they didn't, they wouldn't be men."

"You're a couple of daft old besoms, the pair of you."

Both Nanny and Mrs. Cake jumped, Nanny nearly choking on her sweet. Behind them, like the crankiest of the three Fates, stood Granny, staring down with disapproval written over her face like magic marker.

"Didn't…didn't see you there, Esme," Nanny wheezed, spitting out the sweet and wiping her eyes. "What brings you down this way?"

"Me."

Susan had appeared on the other side, glaring much like Granny, though there was an edge of weariness to it. "And I'd really like to know just what fresh hell you two have planned. If I'm going to be stuck dealing with it, I'd like to have some warning."

Nanny held up a placating hand, aware that Granny was watching her like a hawk. "You've got a restin' period," she said. "He won't come back to bother you until you've healed up. Evadne and I have been talkin', and we think we might know a way that would keep him from drainin' you."

_I can think of one, too_, Susan thought, shivering slightly--the day had been unusually warm, but it felt like it would snow again before nightfall. _It's called me taking even his undead life away._ It was almost unnerving, how well Granny had predicted Nanny's actions, but then the two had known one another all their lives--it was like guessing what Granddad was going to do next. Though on that vein, she had no idea just what Granddad and Albert were planning, and she had a feeling that whatever it was, she wouldn't like it.

_One thing at a time_. Susan didn't want to admit it, but Granny's plan that she just 'go along with it' might be easier to carry out than Granny thought. Certain parts of her mind--all the parts that were directly wired in to her body, mostly--would quite happily quit fighting him, and that realization did not make her happy. How easy it would be, to give up all that control--how was _that_ right?

She sighed. It wasn't, and that, really, was most of the problem. She'd been fighting him all along, and while she was addicted she _knew_ she was addicted--he'd not turned her into a mindless slave, and even if she was to stop actively resisting, she was pretty sure he still wouldn't. After all--and this made her twitch--a _mindless _toy would be no fun at all.

Granny, Nanny, and Mrs. Cake were all bickering. Susan ignored them, wandering over the grass, until one sentence dragged her attention back with a vengeance.

"--can stay with me, until she's better," Nanny was saying.

"I don't think so." Granny folded her arms, glaring down at Nanny. "She's stayin' with me, and no arguin'. Little bastard shows up at _my_ place, he won't be able to sit down for a week."

Susan cast Granny a grateful look. She didn't want to have to go back to Death's country, but the more she thought about it she didn't want to stay with Mrs. Ogg, either. Given the yard decorations, and some of the novelty's in the lady's house, she'd find no peace of mind here.

"Well, all right," Nanny conceded. "I think he'll stay well away anyway, but if he does show up early I reckon you can handle him."

Susan, seeing Granny's expression, rather thought she could, too.

"Come on, my girl. Best be getting back." Susan followed Granny out of the yard, her knees already less watery.

------

In Ankh-Morpork, Teatime was having rather a hard time of it.

It was all well and good for Nanny to say 'flowers, chocolate, and jewelry', but she'd neglected to tell him how to _acquire_ such things. He'd wandered up and down the snowy streets, a wraith in Assassin's black, and though people could see him they all gave him a wide berth--Assassins tended to walk unhindered anyhow, but one look at those mismatched eyes sent even the most foolhardy scurrying. Teatime stopped a few, asking where he might find chocolate (that seemed to be the easiest start), and eventually found himself in front of Weinrich and Bottecher's.

He had to admit, the place had style. Warped though he was, he'd been brought up in a school that taught elegance as well as killing, and this place had it in spades. A few chocolates displayed on a china plate, backed by black velvet--yes, this was definitely the place.

After some thoughtful consideration he went inside, perusing the display cases. The clerk--well, not a clerk; nobody who worked in such an establishment could possibly be called a clerk--let him get on with it. He'd received specific instructions regarding customers, and this one fell into the category of 'leave be'; he looked like he might have money, and such people were to be allowed to browse before being hit with the sales pitch.

Teatime stopped before the last case. All of them were impressive, but this one was hellishly so--the chocolates looked like little works of art, their various delicate swirls crafted into small, intricate pictures.

"I'll have an assortment of these, please," he said, and the clerk practically started drooling--a box of those cost more than many people made in a year.

"Would you care to pick a box, sir?" He gestured to a row of display boxes. Not a single one of them was pasteboard--they looked like they'd cost nearly as much as the chocolate itself, and this was often the case.

Teatime regarded them, staring with an intensity that was beginning to make the clerk nervous. "That one," he said at last, pointing to a box of what looked like teak, varnished black, the lid inlaid with a complicated pattern of jet beads.

"Of course, sir." Watching the clerk do up the chocolates was like watching a dancer--apparently the packing was an art form in and of itself, as the layers were separated by tissue that somehow managed to rustle expensively. Once finished, he carried the thing almost reverently to the cash register. "That will be four hundred sixty-five dollars, sir."

Ah. There was the snag. Being undead, Teatime had no money, nor did he have any way of acquiring any. Hmmm….

The clerk watched him with growing impatience. Assassins were supposed to be rich--the ones that weren't tended to be dead, but years of experience meant he could tell quite well what this sort of hesitation meant. "Sir, that will be--"

Teatime gave him a bright smile. "I don't think so," he said. The was a blur, and the glint of a knife, and before he knew it the clerk was folding like a wet taco around Teatime's fist. The knife was so sharp he'd hardly felt it, nor was he aware when it was removed.

"Nothing personal," Teatime said, taking the box. "But I don't have time to haggle over payment."

"Fzgthg," the clerk managed, before collapsing with a thud.

"Have a nice day," Teatime called over his shoulder, stepping out into the snow with the box under his arm.

Well, okay, that was one item ticked off. Jewelry would be a bit more difficult…he had no idea what Susan would like, but something one of the boys in the Guild had said came back to him--antiques were more valuable. Heirlooms, handed down from generation to generation…hey, _there_ was an idea. His mother, so far as he could remember, had had a beautiful ring, that would be just perfect.

Now all he needed was a shovel.

------

Back in Death's country, Death and Albert were pouring over _Twerp's Peerage_, occasionally making notes and dog-earing pages. Each kept up a continued muttered monologue, mostly along the lines of, "no, that one's a complete twat" and HE'LL BE DEAD IN TWO MONTHS.

The Death of Rats, perched on top of Death's lead paperweight, watched with interest. He was more than a little puzzled, that his master and Albert thought this plan had any chance at all of working, but it wasn't his job to interfere.

Besides, he always did like a good show. And once Susan found out about the whole thing, a good show was pretty much guaranteed.

------

Granny didn't have anything even remotely like a spare bedroom, but she got some of Nanny's sons to haul an extra bed up into the attic, so Susan could sleep there during her stay. Susan, for her part, was immensely grateful to be in a place that was both quiet and free of well-meaning but bumbling family. And, for once, she could sleep without fear of having her dreams invaded.

"What kind of mess d'you think he's plannin'?" Granny asked after supper, brewing another pot of tea.

"I don't know," said Susan, wrestling a brush through her hair. "And I really, really don't want to find out. I suppose it would be too much to hope he'd get distracted by some other shiny thing." She didn't have a clue what could distract Teatime, but there had to be something…didn't there?

"Well, rest up, my girl, and we'll deal with that later. He won't come back till you're better…Gytha and I can see to that, at least."

That was a relief. Really. Susan honestly didn't believe she'd miss him, miss his presence in her sleep. That would be stupid, and Susan's conscious mind didn't have a lot of time for stupid.

Her subconscious, however, was going to prove tricky.

----

A/N: Muahahaha…Next chapter sees all the horrible, twisted, terribly misguided things Teatime does in the name of courtship. PHEER.


	9. Nothing says Romance like Grave Robbing

Perpetrator's Note: Updated at long, LONG last. Poor Susan. I'm so mean to her it isn't even funny. (Well, okay, it is, but she certainly doesn't think so.) Though to be fair, Teatime's existence isn't half so carefree as he'd like it, either. Add in Death and Albert's attempts at the Dating Game and you've got…problems (as do most of Susan's suitors, once Teatime finds out). XD Also, cookies to anyone who can spot the two _Hot Fuzz _references.

------

Four days passed uneventfully, which to Susan seemed a minor miracle. She was quite happy to let her strength come back at its own pace--at least it was coming back, making her feel more like her normal caustic self. Her sleep those nights was deep and untroubled, but it also felt…lacking, somehow, which made her absolutely furious. It wasn't much; in the rain-gauge of regret, it was little more than a light mist, but it was there, and she couldn't deny it any more than she could do away with it.

She couldn't deny it, but she _could_ ignore it, at least while she was awake. She spent her days working with Granny--tending the goats and the near-dormant beehives, splitting wood and occasionally shoveling snow. Though she'd grown up the child of a duke, Susan enjoyed working with her hands, and it served to take her mind off things she'd just as soon not think about.

She'd been expecting Teatime to be the one who broke her idyll, but that didn't turn out to be the case. Instead, on the fifth day, Mrs. Ogg came to fetch her with the news that Death and Albert had come to see her, and had brought…company. More than that Nanny would not say, and both Susan and Granny followed back to Nanny's cottage with deep misgivings.

"Look at it this way," Granny said, reading Susan's expression rather more accurately than Susan would have liked, "it can't be any worse than your demon."

"You don't know Granddad," Susan said darkly. "Trust me, if _anyone_ can come up with something worse than Teatime, it's him."

As it turned out, she was right. When Mrs. Ogg led her into the tidy, overstuffed parlor, Susan found not only her grandfather and Albert, but a small herd of bewildered and clearly uneasy young men.

She halted, realization hitting her like a boot to the head. "Oh,_gods_," she groaned, covering her face with her hand. "No," she said. "Just…no. Out, all of you, and Granddad, I would like a_word_ with you."

Death tapped his fingers on his scythe, awkward. SUSAN, I'VE--

"I _know _what you've done, and I think I know why, and I WANT A BLOODY WORD WITH YOU."

The effect those words had on the gaggle of young men was electric--as one they flinched away, looking from Susan to Death and clearly calculating their chances should they decide to run for it.

Death got the hint, and followed Susan into the kitchen, leaving the young men to the mercies of Nanny and Granny. Susan rubbed her forehead.

"All right, I think I know what you're doing, and why, but for gods' sakes, _that_ is not the answer." She gestured to the sitting-room, fluttering a hand in a gesture of helpless frustration. "If you want to help me, find…well, find a solution that will actually _work_." _And one I wouldn't tear my hair out before taking._

IF YOU'LL JUST TALK TO THEM, Death said, sounding slightly desperate. THEY'RE ALL VERY NICE--ALBERT AND I CHOSE CAREFULLY.

Susan shut her eyes. "I did not just hear that," she groaned. "Granddad, in case you hadn't noticed, they're all terrified out of their wits, and I can't blame them! Besides, I don't want to get married. To anyone. And especially not to some poor sod who's too frightened to say no."

STILL--COULD IT HURT? JUST…TALK TO THEM. PLEASE?

Susan eyed him. Her grandfather was terrible at wheedling, but she often gave in out of sheer embarrassment on his behalf. With a sigh, she did so now. "All right," she snapped. "But you'd best take them all back where you found them when we're done." The last thing she needed was to have to baby-sit a load of petrified young nobles hundreds of miles from home.

Death's fixed grin seemed to widen in relief. GOOD. THEY HAVE ALL BEEN APPRISED OF YOUR SITUATION--YOU WILL NOT HAVE TO EXPLAIN.

"Thank gods for small favors," she muttered, heading back into the parlor. "All right, you lot, I'm sorry you got dragged out here, and I've made Granddad promise to take you all back where he found you when we're through."

The Death of Rats scurried up and handed her a stack of pasteboard cards. Susan took them, flipping them through with a sigh. "'What's your perfect Sunday'?" she asked, raising an eyebrow at the rat. It SQUEAK'd happily.

"Well, this is going to be a long day," she said, rubbing her temples. "All right, let's get this over with."

------

Grave-digging in the snow is even harder than it sounds. Ankh-Morpork's normally soupy soil had frozen into something rather harder than rock, and several hours with a pickaxe had only got him halfway down.

Teatime scowled. His range of weird quasi-demonic powers did not, apparently, include the ability to summon objects at will, and he'd been forced to go about this the old-fashioned way, which meant a lot of hacking with a pickaxe and much inventive grumbling. Most of the city's dead were eventually dug up again, and placed in the crypts, but his parents had been wealthy and thus had been able to afford to stay decently buried, unfortunately.

"She'd better like this," he muttered, hacking away. He still didn't quite grasp the whole 'happy' concept, but Nanny had been very firm on the jewelry bit, so he assumed it would all be alright. Presumably, all this stuff would keep Susan from going to her grandfather's, and thus keep her available to him, and that was all to the good. He was getting frustrated enough, spending so much time without her--once this week was up he was going to her, whether any of them wanted it or not.

The actual implications of this had not really hit Teatime yet. That she was addicted to him was a given; what he still hadn't fully fathomed was the fact that _he_ was just as addicted to_her_. If he really did lose her he would be, to use the country phrase, shit out of luck. He had to trick her into wanting to stay--that was imperative, and he was willing to use any and all tricks available to do so. He wanted her back, wanted her with a truly disturbing intensity--if he got this done by evening he could see her again her this evening, and damn all those old biddies. The thought of Granny Weatherwax made him distinctly uneasy, but even that wasn't enough to actually stop him. He knew he couldn't sleep with her again just yet, but that didn't mean he couldn't_see_ her.

At last, after another hour of digging, his pickaxe hit the lid of the coffin. He grinned, hacking now at the coffin itself--with any luck, he'd be able to be back in Lancre by dinnertime.

------

Susan had been right--it really _had _been a long day. She'd done her best not to be too unkind to all the young men, since it was hardly their fault they'd been abducted, but her temper was her temper, and eventually it gave out. The resultant shouting match with her grandfather, Albert, Nanny Ogg, and Mrs. Cake was enough to draw the attention of half the town, most of whom scattered when a wrathful Susan burst out the front door (having had to kick it open first) and tried to stalk back to Granny's.

She was intercepted by Granny herself. Alone of them all, Granny seemed to actually understand, at least a little, and so Susan allowed herself to be led back to Nanny's, fuming all the while.

A glass of scumble cooled her temper, or at least dulled it, and when it had done all it was going to do, she found herself sitting with her head in her hands.

"Your week's almost up," Granny said, not unkindly. "What will you do then?"

Susan shrugged. "I think I might go home for a while," she said. "Home to Sto Helit. I don't know if Teatime can find me if I'm not where he expects me to be, so it might be I can extend my reprieve." Death had collected him this time, and dragged him out to Lancre, so in theory at least he wouldn't be able to locate her right away. She hadn't set foot in the castle since her parents died, but she knew it and it knew her, and it might be that such knowledge could keep Teatime out even if he _did _find her.

As if her thoughts had summoned him like some kind of insane demon, Teatime chose that moment to stumble into the kitchen. He'd had to hop back into the land of the dead to get there so quickly, which had _not_ been pleasant, and as a result he was one cranky Assassin. He'd got everything Nanny instructed, though, and he was damn well going to give all his presents.

"You were supposed to stay away for a week," Susan said, accusingly. "No cheating."

"I _will_ go away, once I've done this," he said, beaming at her, all his annoyance abruptly forgotten. He was carrying several parcels and a bouquet of flowers, and Susan eyed them rather askance--she wasn't sure she wanted to know what on earth was in them. "I got you presents."

Granny raised an eyebrow, as did Albert, and even Nanny looked curious. She'd wondered how he'd fare in Ankh-Morpork, but the black box at least looked promising--she wouldn't have expected Teatime to have actual _taste_.

"How…nice," Susan said, keeping Granny's words in mind. Besides, part of her was rather morbidly curious as to just what kind of 'present' someone like Teatime might pick out. He put all his parcels on the table, watching expectantly as she opened the black box first.

To her surprise, it was nothing disgusting--it was, if she was any judge, an assortment of very, very expensive chocolate. How he had known to get her such a thing, she had no idea; she suspected Nanny and/or Mrs. Cake's involvement. Either way, he'd picked it out somewhat disturbingly well.

The second was a rather smaller box which, accuracy with chocolates not withstanding, she opened very, very carefully. It turned out to contain a ring, which would have been lovely if that had been _all_ it contained. She stared, wishing she could register it with some kind of disbelief--unfortunately, she knew Teatime much too well to be surprised. It really was a beautiful ring--all flashing diamonds and glittering sapphires that somehow contrived to be the exact shade of her eyes. The effect was rather spoiled, however, by the dry, half-rotted mummy finger (literally, though Susan didn't yet know that) still stuck inside it.

"I couldn't get it out," Teatime explained, seeing her expression. "I was hoping you'd have a pair of pliers."

Susan's face was a picture, of the sort usually painted by Salvador Dali. "Um," she said, for once lost for any real reaction. Nobody else in the room seemed able to summon one, either, though Nanny rolled her eyes. Trust him to get it _half_ right. "I realize I'm probably going to regret asking this, but where, precisely, did you get this ring?"

"It was my mother's," he said, still beaming. "And it was bloody hard to get, I might add. The ground's frozen solid."

They all stared at it in rather horrified fascination. "You went grave-robbing for me?" Susan asked, not quite registering her own words. "How…uh…sweet." The thought that _anyone _might find a ring with finger still attached sweet…well, it was a very_Teatime_ form of logic. She kept staring at it while Teatime disappeared, and reappeared a moment later with, naturally, a pair of pliers.

"Here, let me," he said, taking ring and finger back for a moment. After some tricky maneuvering, the finger came out with a rather disgustingly dry _pop_. "There, much better." He passed the ring back, and looked at the finger as though slightly unsure what to do with it, until he noticed Greebo and tossed it into the cat's bowl. As if that wasn't bad enough, Greebo quite happily ate it.

"Well, that was…disturbing," Susan said, breaking the rather frozen pause. "Um…yes. Well, uh, thank you?" What else _could_ she say, really?

Teatime's manic grin widened. She'd _liked_ it. The fact that the ring-and-finger combo had not been a winner was completely lost on him--the chocolates had been a success, at least, and she didn't need to know that he'd swiped the flowers off the grave next to his mother's. What was it you were supposed to say, when someone thanked you? Ah, yes. "You're welcome," he said, then, with a rather uncharacteristic wisdom, he left them all alone with Susan's new…presents.

Susan looked at the ring in her palm, and at Greebo, and at the rest of the assembly. The chocolates she'd happily eat (even if some small part of her couldn't help but wondering if he'd poisoned them), but she had _no idea_ what to do with the ring. It was too pretty to throw out, but she didn't know just what she_could_ do with it. Hide it with all her mother's jewelry at home, perhaps.

"Well," Nanny said, "it's the thought that counts." Susan looked at her, eyebrows raised.

"Yes, and the fact that he thought to dig up his dead mother to steal her ring is a very _special_ kind of thoughtful," she said, her voice dry as the Great Nef. "Every time I think this whole situation can't get any more bizarre, I wind up with something like a severed finger."

"Ah, romance," Nanny said. "Look on the bright side. At least he didn't bring the whole hand."

"Or the whole corpse," Mrs. Cake put in.

Susan digested this. "I need some air," she said, shaking her head.

It was snowing when she went outside, light flakes that were already obscuring the manicured lawn--how anything could be green in the winter, she didn't know. It must be some kind of witch thing. She stood under the eaves and watched it come swirling down, wondering for perhaps the millionth time just what she was going to do about this. Just at present, what she really, _really _wanted was more scumble.


End file.
